Robert Byrd

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. I thank the Chair. Now, Mr. President, the point I am trying to make here is--and I wanted it in the Record, and I wanted Senators to be aware of what they did when they voted to invoke cloture on last Friday. The distinguished occupant of the chair did not vote to invoke cloture, nor did this Senator, who now is speaking. There were 29 Democrats who voted against cloture last Friday. There were 17 Democrats who voted for cloture last Friday. As I note--and this may have been a cursory examination I have made--but I have noted, in a cursory examination, I believe two Republicans who were absent would have voted with me against cloture and I believe four Democrats who were absent would have voted with me against cloture. In any event, had 6 of the 17 Democrats who voted for cloture voted against cloture last Friday, we would not be under cloture at this point because the number of Senators voting for cloture on last Friday would have been only 59 and the number, therefore, would have fallen 1 vote short of cloture. Now, I tried to get my fellow Democrats to vote against cloture because I felt that we ought to have more time to discuss this homeland security bill, which had been dropped on our desks virtually out of the shades of the early morning as they were lifting and the golden fingers of dawn were streaking across the land. I tried to get several Senators to vote against cloture, my plea being: ``Don't vote for cloture today. Give us a little more time. If we don't vote for cloture today, it will be voted next week ``--meaning this week, which we have now started. ``Don't vote for cloture today.'' One or two Senators listened to my importunings and voted against cloture. Mr. President, I ask for an additional 3 minutes.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I have a series of parliamentary inquiries. As I understand the situation on tomorrow, Tuesday, there will be 90 minutes of debate before a vote occurs at 10:30; during that 90 minutes of debate there will be 30 minutes under the control of Mr. Lott, 30 minutes under the control of Mr. Daschle, and 30 minutes under the control of Mr. Byrd; is that correct?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, at 10:30 it is my understanding--and I would like to inquire if I am correct in my understanding--the first vote will occur on the Daschle-Lieberman second-degree amendment No. 4953; a second vote will occur on the Daschle-Lieberman first-degree amendment No. 4911; a third vote will occur on the Thompson substitute, House bill No. 4901; the fourth vote will occur on cloture on H.R. 5005; am I correct?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank the Chair but let me continue. As I understand it, the Thompson substitute, House bill No. 4901, that is the substitute which was passed by the House of Representatives, sent to the Senate, and called up and laid before the Senate. That is the bill which first saw the light of day in the Senate, as I understand it, on or about the early morning hours of this last Wednesday, this past Wednesday of last week. Is that the amendment, the Thompson substitute amendment, that is the House bill which I, on a number of occasions, have referred to as being a bill of 484 pages?

Mr. BYRD. I just wanted to be sure to establish in my own mind and call to the Senate's attention that that will be the third vote, then, on that bill as we come to tomorrow morning, Tuesday of this week. Now, Mr. President, a further parliamentary inquiry: Am I correct in stating that cloture on the bill, H.R. 5005, is not vitiated by question of the adoption of the substitute?

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Madam President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. BYRD. The Senator says he is confident that the Congress will do no such thing? I say most respectfully to the Senator, I would not count on what the next Congress might do. I am very much afraid of what the next Congress might do in many areas. Doesn't the Senator share that feeling?

Mr. BYRD. I yield whatever time he may wish to consume to the distinguished Senator from Vermont, Mr. Leahy, with my retaining the floor.

Mr. BYRD. The distinguished Senator from Vermont is welcome, and I congratulate him.

Mr. BYRD. For not to exceed 25 minutes--15 and 10--and that I then regain my right to the floor, even though I may walk away from the floor in the meantime.

Mr. BYRD. And will be for the next 30.

Mr. BYRD. I say, Congress normally would not do that. But I am not too sure what the next Congress might do.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Yes, the House could accept the amendment. If the Senate adopts the amendment, the House could accept it and there would be no conference.

Mr. BYRD. I should think so. It would be my feeling, Mr. President, that we ought to look at the amendment on its face, on its merits, and vote for it. If I were disposed to vote against it--there are some who will--but those of us who are for it should not back away because of some scare tactic that is being used by the White House to try to get Members to vote against that amendment. Where is the House of Representatives supposed to be? They get paid the same salaries as we do. Their job is not finished. Our job is not finished. Why shouldn't they be here? Over the many years I have been in the Senate, 44 years now, time and time again I have seen the House pass a conference report or appropriations bill or something, and walk away and leave the Senate holding the bag. There is no reason why they should not have to come back, if we pass an amendment and it goes to conference. They should come back and finish their work. This is an important piece of work. They ought not go home on the pretext that, if this measure is passed by the Senate, they should not have a conference on it. Or the White House should not be spreading the scare stories. If the House wants to have a conference, that's fine. If the House doesn't want to have a conference and wants to accept the bill, it can, or it wants to accept the amendment, it can. Then that could go to the President for his veto, if he wishes.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator. I would only add that if the whole thing comes down, that may be for the best. That may be for the best. It has a lot more wrong with that bill suddenly dumped upon us in the early hours of Wednesday morning. As far as I am concerned, greater mischief can happen in many ways than having that bill die. As far as I am concerned, we ought to be back next year and take our time and do a good job on that bill. I have always been for homeland security. I was one of the first around here to state that we needed a Department of Homeland Security. But this bill that has 484 pages in it, that has been suddenly dumped upon us, dumped on us--as far as I am concerned, it would be no great tragedy if that bill would die and we could start again next year. Having that bill is not going to make the American people one whit more secure--not one whit--because even if that bill is passed, the President is going to have 12 months in which to submit his plan, which we know nothing about at this time. When we pass this bill, we will not know anything about his plan. But under that bill the Congress authorizes the President to submit his plan. That plan will automatically go into effect after a certain number of months, the most of which would be 12 months. It will automatically go into effect. We don't know today what is in his plan. He probably doesn't know yet what he intends to submit as a plan. As far as I am concerned, we are buying a pig in the poke and Senators ought not vote for that bill. But at the very least, Senators ought to vote for this amendment because it does clean up a little bit of what is wrong with the bill.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, tomorrow morning the Senate will vote on the amendment introduced by Senator Daschle to the homeland security bill. This amendment will strike several provisions in the bill that were added by the other body in the dark of night without their ever having seen the light of day until after they were adopted. I have added my name as a cosponsor of the amendment because I was troubled by the substance of these last-minute provisions. I was pleased that Senator Daschle and Senator Lieberman were taking action to strike the new language from the bill. I support the amendment and I hope that other Senators will support it, as well. I have cosponsored the amendment because I believe the Senate has a duty to take the time to improve legislation when it needs improving, as it does, obviously. This bill certainly needs improving. I had hoped that more Senators would be able to offer their amendments to this bill. I have heard several of my colleagues expressing concerns about what is in the bill, as well as what is not in the bill. I have concerns of my own, many of which I have expressed in recent days. I also have amendments that could be offered to address these problems, just as other Senators have amendments that they had hoped to offer. But here we are, consuming all of our time under cloture in consideration of this single amendment. The Senators in the minority are keeping us from voting on the Daschle amendment until all 30 hours of debate have run. The Republican side of the aisle is doing this to prevent other amendments from being offered during this time. While the administration is pressing hard to avoid other amendments, the die was already cast for this bill when the Senate voted last Friday to invoke cloture. Caesar crossed the Rubicon on January 11, in the year 49 A.D., on the night of January 11. Whether he crossed the Rubicon before midnight or after midnight on that night, I don't recall; I am not sure I ever knew. It was on that night that he crossed the Rubicon. He paused thoughtfully and then he said: The die is cast. So be it. I voted against cloture last week on Friday because I believed that there were problems in this bill that should be thoroughly addressed in the Senate; that we needed more time to debate those problems and that we needed more time in which to offer amendments to the 484-page bill that had been dropped on our desks on the morning of last Wednesday. I tried to get some of our Democratic colleagues to vote against cloture on Friday, so that we would have a little more time in which we Senators and our staffs could study that hurriedly-put-together bill, hurriedly passed by the other body. I felt that we should not invoke cloture on last Friday, that we should take a few more days, study the bill, and try to amend it before cloture, as I knew, would finally be adopted. But my words were to little avail. There was at least one Senator who did vote against cloture at my importuning him to do so. And I deeply appreciated his willingness to listen and his willingness to vote against cloture. There were others who were not quite so willing. They listened patiently, but they went on their way and voted for cloture. Some of them thought that, inasmuch as we would then have 30 hours under cloture, we could offer our amendments. But I knew that the entire 30 hours could be spent on one amendment. I had never seen it done before, but it very well could be. I was aware of that. I didn't think it would be done, but we have seen it has been done by the Republican minority, which has said: This far; no farther. You have offered one amendment, that being the Daschle amendment on behalf of himself and Mr. Lieberman--you have offered that amendment, and the entire 30 hours will be spent on that amendment. You will not have any opportunity to offer any other amendment. I still believe that there are serious problems in the bill that go far beyond the provisions stricken by the Daschle amendment. That was not an all-encompassing amendment as far as I was concerned. It was an amendment in the right direction but, even with the adoption of the amendment, there is going to be a tremendous amount of power shifted to the President. He is going to have a full year in which to indicate to the rest of us what his plan is for reorganizing, and for organizing the new Department. He probably doesn't know at this moment what his plan will be. But he has a year, under this bill, to offer his plan. And it will, ipso facto, automatically go into effect at some point. Congress is out of the loop. Congress will not be asked to approve his plan. Congress will only be informed of his plan. That's it. We have no further say in the matter. So his plan, being a pig in a poke, a plan which we do not know now, that plan will at some point go into effect without any further vote on the part of Congress. Congress will not be asked to approve it. And this bill, which we will pass on tomorrow, will not give Congress the right to vote to approve that plan. Moreover, an amendment, if I had been able to offer it, to provide for congressional approval--that amendment would not have been germane under cloture. So we were headed off there. So we have helped to cut our own throats, to a degree, by having voted for cloture last Friday. I urged Senators last Friday, as I said before, not to vote for cloture last week, so we would have more time in which to read and study this bill that was dropped suddenly into our laps by the other body. I pleaded with this Senate not to shut off debate and limit amendments, and 28 other Senators voted with me not to do so. There were 29 Senators who voted against it and they were all Democrats. Mr. President, 29 Democrats voted against cloture last Friday. Only 17 Democrats voted for some cloture. There were other Democrats who were absent and not voting and their votes, of course--at least four of those Senators would have voted against cloture. That would have brought the vote up to 33 votes against cloture, well over half the Democratic caucus. So that if only six of the 17 Senators who did vote for cloture last Friday had not voted for cloture and voted against it, or had not voted for cloture, then there would have only been 59 votes for cloture, which would have meant that cloture would not have been invoked. Sixty-five votes in totality were for cloture. So all that was needed to defeat cloture was for six of those Senators who voted for cloture to vote against cloture. Many of my colleagues last week, as I pleaded with them to vote against cloture, reassured me that we would have the opportunity to offer amendments after cloture was invoked. But those Members should look carefully at where the Senate stands today, because there is an important lesson to be learned about the rules of the Senate and the effect of cloture on the ability of Senators to offer amendments. Not only have Senators been restricted to offering only those amendments that are ruled to be germane--and we know that under the cloture rule-- but Senators have been unable to offer any amendments at all, other than the amendment introduced by the majority leader. Not all Senators could foresee that would happen, but all Senators should have known that could happen under the rule. It did happen. So I hope the Senators who voted for cloture, some of them at least, will have some afterthoughts that will help in the future to remind them that we ought not be in such a great hurry to invoke cloture, especially on an extremely complicated bill which has been brought to our attention in its entirety just within the past few days beginning with last Wednesday. When I say to Senators that we should not shirk our responsibilities as legislators by invoking cloture, especially so quickly, so early on, I understand the kind of opportunities that are available under cloture, we will all understand this in the future. I understand that the rules of the Senate have been used fairly to prevent amendments from being offered to the homeland security legislation. When I hear the arguments that voting for the single amendment that has been offered will jeopardize passage of the bill, I understand that such arguments were made possible by the vote to invoke cloture. The Senate has painted itself, in a way, into a corner, by invoking cloture on the Thompson amendment. We have no one to blame but ourselves for allowing the administration and the other body to characterize this modest amendment as a threat to the passage of homeland security legislation. The administration wants to limit any amendments to one up-or-down vote so that the administration can argue that a vote for this amendment is a vote to ``kill'' the homeland security bill. There is simply no basis whatsoever in fact for the administration's attempts to politicize this vote by claiming that the vote on this amendment by Mr. Daschle and Mr. Lieberman will kill the bill. This legislation has been introduced for consideration by the Senate, and the extent of that consideration should not be confined to a few days of debate over whether simply to rubberstamp the legislation so it can be sent to the President for his signature. If the President wants to insist on getting this bill passed before Congress adjourns, he could persuade both Houses of Congress to pass bills and work out their differences in conference. Such a conference is one which may or may not take very long. As a matter of fact, the House could very well accept the amendment, if the amendment by Mr. Daschle and Mr. Lieberman should prevail--the House could very well accept that amendment, and the bill would go to the President. For now, I think the Senate should do its job. Senators need to look carefully at the bill, do what they can to make improvements before voting. And they only have this one chance--vote up or down on the Daschle amendment. That will help some but not enough. But that might allow some Senators in their own good consciences to vote for the bill. As far as I am concerned, it is not enough because there would still be a tremendous shift of power from the legislative branch to the President. And I don't feel like shifting that power to any President--not just this one, but in particular this administration with its way of wanting to do things in a secretive manner and wanting to run a government out of the White House, and not in the full light of day or under the full scrutiny of the press and the people. I intend to vote against this bill, and I know that a majority of Senators will likely vote for it. But whether Senators plan to vote for this bill or against it, we should all work to make sure that the Senate passes the best possible bill that it can under the circumstances. We ought to act responsibly in response to this eleventh-hour legislation that did not see the light of day until only a few days ago. We should not surrender our duties under the Constitution by allowing legislation to be dictated to this Senate in an atmosphere of political brinkmanship. Senator Daschle's amendment strikes a number of very troubling provisions that were added to this bill at the last minute in the hopes that the Senate would cave in to the administration's empty rhetoric. Senator Daschle and Senator Lieberman have called this bluff, and this amendment has cast a high-powered spotlight on language in this bill that cannot possibly withstand the light of day and the strict scrutiny of time. These shameful provisions could never survive public scrutiny, and now that they have been brought into focus, the Senate must ensure that they do not survive our consideration. So let us see on tomorrow whether or not the Senate has the will and the courage to take a strong stand against this power grab. That stand can be taken by voting for the Daschle-Lieberman amendment. This amendment strikes several provisions in this bill that do not deserve to be enacted into law. The first of these provisions in one that I have previously addressed, relating to unnecessary and dangerous exemptions from the Federal Advisory Committee Act. The language in this bill would give new blanket authority to the Secretary of Homeland Security to exempt advisory committees from existing public disclosure and conflict-of-interest rules. These rules already allow exemptions for sensitive information relating to national security. This bill would allow the Secretary to cloak committee activities behind a veil of secrecy, regardless of whether those activities actually involve issues of national security. I believe that too much secrecy in government is dangerous to our civil liberties, and we should not authorize such broad exemptions without compelling evidence of the need for unchecked blanket authority. The President of the United States already has that authority on a case-by-case basis. But now we are going to extend it to the Secretary of the new Department, and of course he can exercise blanket authority if he so wishes. If we are to preserve our liberty and the integrity of our constitutional system, executive decision making must be subject to scrutiny and oversight by the Congress, the media, and the public. I support striking this language from the bill, and I thank Senators Daschle and Lieberman for bringing it to the attention of the Senate. The Daschle amendment also strikes several provisions in this bill that protect corporate campaign contributors from lawsuits. The first of these provisions would prohibit lawsuits against companies that manufacture vaccines by people who have been harmed by those vaccines, including children suffering from autism as a result of preservatives used in childhood vaccines. Another of these liability provisions would enact sweeping tort reform for products that are designated as anti-terrorism technologies. These provisions would protect companies that manufacture everything from gas masks to computer software when their products fail, even when the companies know that their products will not work. The final liability provision would give immunity to companies responsible for providing security screening in airports. The Senate rejected similar language last year during its consideration of the airline ``bailout'' bill, yet now we are being asked to approve it because it has been inserted into politically popular legislation. The attempt to slip this provision past the Senate is another example of the haste with which this bill has been drafted and considered by this Congress. Issues like these liability provisions should be carefully scrutinized before they become law, not just rubber-stamped by impatient lawmakers looking to put issues behind them and go home. Another provision that has already been considered by this Senate relates to doing business with companies that have moved their headquarters out of the United States to avoid paying U.S. taxes. In its consideration of the Lieberman substitute to the homeland security bill, the Senate adopted an amendment offered by the late Senator Wellstone that prohibited the Secretary of Homeland Security from contracting with such companies, unless he needed to do so for national security reasons. The Thompson substitute guts the Wellstone amendment by allowing the Secretary expanded powers to waive this prohibition to prevent the loss of jobs or to save money for the government. The Senate should reject this attempt to undermine the will of the Senate by restoring the language of Senator Wellstone's amendment to the homeland security bill. The Thompson substitute also tries to slip in language to delay the implementation of new airport security regulations. The Senate enacted procedures in last year's airline security bill for the Transportation Security Agency to issue regulations for improving security in our Nation's airports. The new language in the Thompson substitute would modify these procedures by requiring the Transportation Security Oversight Board to ratify any regulations before they become effective. I see no good reason for this modification, If there is one, the Senate should take the time to debate it rather than hastily approving it as part of this massive legislation. The final provision that will be stricken by the Daschle-Lieberman- Byrd amendment is the language directing that a new homeland security research center be created at Texas A&M University. I don't think the amendment specifically says that, but its provisions are such that that particular university would be most favored and targeted for location of such a center. The amendment removes items from the list of highly specific criteria which all but guaranteed that Texas A&M would be the only university which would qualify for the new research center. Mr. President, striking these provisions from the Thompson amendment is a good start. I believe that the Senate should go further in fulfilling its constitutional duty to improve this legislation before passing this bill. I believe there are many other provisions of this bill which should be stricken and begun anew next year. In fact, I think we would all be more secure if we put off the whole bill and started over next year. For example, there is a provision that the President may submit his recommendations to Congress and the only thing that Congress can do is just at that point agree to his recommendations. The Congress has no opportunity to approve or not approve of those recommendations as far as this bill is concerned. We might expect a great deal of chaos as these 28 agencies are moved into the Department. This will take place within the next year. The President has not yet submitted his plan for having the agencies moved into the new Department, but his plan will be submitted at some point and, ipso facto, will go into effect. Under an amendment which I had offered earlier to the homeland security measure--that being at that time, I believe, the Lieberman bill that came out of the committee of which he is chairman--I had offered an amendment to provide for an orderly phase-in of agencies into the new Department over a period of a year. Under my amendment, the recommendations of the administration would have gone to the Lieberman committee and to its counterpart in the House of Representatives. And those two committees would have had an opportunity, then, to hold hearings and, under expedited procedures, could have brought out bills, reported bills, to implement the phasing in of agencies into the new Department, with there being three phases, of 120 days each, which would have created an orderly process whereby these various agencies would have been phased into the new Department. Also, the Congress would have been kept in the loop in each case, with the Lieberman committee and its counterpart in the House being able to hold hearings, call witnesses, vote out bills by expedited procedures. Those bills would come to the Senate. They could be called up in the Senate under expedited procedures so that there would be no filibuster, and those bills would be amended, passed on; and in this way the creation of the new Department, with the orderly phasing in of the agencies, would occur over the same period of time--1 year--as is the case with the current bill. As it is, when we pass this bill in the Senate, we are out of the loop; we have automatically put ourselves, the Congress, to the sidelines. And the President then can do as he wishes. He can submit his plan, and that plan would automatically go into effect. Congress will be on the sideline. We will have said: Here it is, Mr. President. It's all yours. We have no more say in it. It's yours. Just be kind enough to let us know what your plans are. That's all we ask. Let us know what your plans are. But under my amendment, those recommendations would have come to the Congress. Congress would have kept itself in the loop. It would have been able to maintain oversight. And with each phase, each of the three phases, as it passed from the first, to the second, to the third, Congress would have benefited by its experience under the first, and then under the second, and there would have been an orderly phase-in, and with Congress, as I say, retaining its place in the loop. But that amendment was opposed even by Mr. Lieberman and, I believe, the majority leader. The majority leader I think voted against it. It was his right to do so. But Mr. Lieberman, the author of the bill which had been reported out by his committee, voted against the amendment. So I thought it would have been an improvement to the bill and certainly would not have been in derogation of the committee in its work. But that amendment was rejected. And there you are. I tried. I failed to bring about that improvement. So that is another improvement that I think ought to still have been put into the bill that is before us. So I have seen the handwriting on the wall. I know this bill will probably pass the Senate. Having said that, I believe that the amendment by Mr. Daschle and Mr. Lieberman is important because it does make some needed improvements to the bill. The Senate has a duty to approve at least these minimal proposals, if I may say that about them--they are important improvements--before handing over this broad grant of power to the executive branch. I urge Senators to vote for the Daschle-Lieberman amendment on tomorrow morning. Mr. President, I yield the floor. procurement policy

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

Mr. BYRD. Yes.

Mr. BYRD. Yes.

Mr. BYRD. By unanimous consent, I had asked to cosponsor the amendment, yes.

Mr. BYRD. Yes.

Mr. BYRD. Yes, I will.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, on another matter, it was just over one year ago, on November 12, 2001, that Afghanistan's government of religious extremists fled Kabul. The rule of the Taliban soon collapsed in the rest of the country, and a new government, endorsed by the United Nations, took shape. Despite this new government, the United States still has more than 8,000 troops in Afghanistan performing a number of important missions, from tracking down al-Qaida terrorists who have taken to the hills to providing security to the new Afghan President. In other words, from tracking down al-Qaida terrorists, who have taken to the hills on the one hand, to providing security to the new Afghan President on the other hand. But the situation in Afghanistan is anything but stable. Our troops still face hit-and-run attacks from al-Qaida and Taliban fighters. The leadership of the new Afghan government has been targeted for assassination. Warlords that control portions of Afghanistan's countryside have questionable allegiance to the central government. Two million Afghan refugees have returned to their homes in the past year, many finding that their homes had been destroyed by war and their fields ravaged by drought. But with the Administration gearing up for a new war in Iraq, important questions must be asked. What is our plan for Afghanistan? How great is the risk that we will lose the peace after winning a war in a poor, landlocked Central Asian country? Is the potential for war with Iraq shifting our attention from unfinished business in Afghanistan? Recent press reports on the situation in Afghanistan are not encouraging. On November 8, the Washington Post carried an article which quotes the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers, as saying that we have ``lost a little momentum'' in tracking down terrorists in Afghanistan. With al Qaeda adapting to our military tactics, the report continues, the Pentagon is now debating whether to emphasize reconstruction efforts at the expense of military operations. Such a shift in mission should not be taken lightly. Unless clear goals are laid out for the rehabilitation of Afghanistan and a sensible strategy is enunciated to achieve those ends, our nation could find its feet sinking into the quicksand that is Afghanistan. I was in Afghanistan 47 years ago. I went to Afghanistan as a member of the subcommittee of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. I saw enough of Afghanistan to convince me at that time that it was very difficult to subjugate that country. Since then, the Soviets tried and failed. Before then, the British tried and they failed. We have already spent over $20 billion in Afghanistan, and we still don't have Osama bin Laden. We are a long way from winning that war, if that is what we are trying to do. Let us not forget our recent, tragic history with nation building, such as our attempts to pacify the chaos of Somalia in the early 1990s. We should also not forget that in 1979, the Soviet Union grabbed control of Kabul in little more than a day, but spent the next nine years trying to extend its control to the rest of the country. Those people are not easy to handle. Today, the United States has no clear goals or sensible strategy for how to work with our allies to rebuild Afghanistan. Instead of a clear plan of action, we hear lip service about a Marshall Plan for Afghanistan. Start sinking money into that bottomless pit. Such grand promises, if left unfulfilled, would send the wrong message to our allies and the Afghan people about our commitment to seeing that that country does not again become a haven for terrorists. The Administration has already sent confusing messages to Congress about its commitment to rebuilding Afghanistan. On August 13, 2002, the President refused to designate as emergency spending $174 million in humanitarian aid for Afghanistan, which was contained in the Fiscal Year 2002 Supplemental Appropriations Act. By refusing to designate those funds as an emergency, the President did not allow the funds to be spent as Congress intended. While the President refused to spend that money, he has publicly promised $300 million in foreign aid to Afghanistan for fiscal year 2003. However, Congress has not received any such request. As the committee report for the Fiscal Year 2003 Foreign Operations Appropriations bill, as reported unanimously from the Senate Appropriations Committee on July 18, states: The Committee is, therefore, perplexed that, despite calls for a Marshall Plan for Afghanistan and the critical importance to U.S. national security, the administration did not submit a formal fiscal year 2003 budget request for Afghanistan. The Committee has been informally advised that the administration plans to spend approximately $98,000,000 for Afghanistan in funds from the Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act. If the administration fails to back up its promises of aid with actual dollars, how are we ever going to complete our mission in Afghanistan? We ought to be reasonable with our promises, but once we make a commitment, this nation should put our money where our mouth is. It is clear that the United States must do more to focus the international community on creating a concrete plan of action for rebuilding Afghanistan. But the first step in creating this plan is to get the administration's attention off of Iraq just long enough to give serious consideration to the problems in Afghanistan. To that end, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has reported a bill to authorize $3.3 billion in aid for Afghanistan. This bill was passed by the Senate last week. While I share with the authors of the bill the great concern about the potential for Afghanistan to slide back into chaos and disorder, I have serious reservations about several provisions of this bill. First, the bill authorizes $3.3 billion in foreign aid for Afghanistan with no indication of why this figure was proposed. It is important to understand that the authorization of those funds does not actually allow the U.S. Government to spend a single dime for Afghanistan. It takes an appropriations bill to spend that money. As Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, the committee that is expected to come up with the cash to fund such an authorization, I do not understand how this figure of $3.3 billion was reached. I am left with the impression that the bill in question authorizes these billions of dollars simply to send a message that rebuilding Afghanistan is an important task. Second, as Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, I am not sure where Congress would find the funds to fulfill the $3.3 billion commitment to Afghanistan. Will the administration support cutting back on some of our foreign aid programs in order to send money to Afghanistan? Or will the administration propose to increase our foreign aid spending in order to fund this new aid package? Without the cooperation of the administration, it would be difficult to appropriate the full amount of the funds that are authorized by this bill. As I am sure the sponsors of the bill would agree, the last thing we need are more empty promises to help the people of Afghanistan. Third, the Afghanistan aid bill contains a sense of the Congress provision that encourages the President to work to expand the U.N. peacekeeping mission now underway in Kabul to include the whole of Afghanistan. Right now, the United States is not a participant in that peacekeeping mission. It is not clear what role our troops would have in such an expanded peacekeeping mission, but Congress should be careful not to endorse the commitment of our soldiers to such a mission before we have an understanding of what that commitment might entail, such as how many troops might be involved, how long they might be there, and what goals must be achieved before withdrawal. Finally, while this bill pushes for more aid and more peacekeepers for Afghanistan, we are still without a plan or strategy for our involvement in that country. The administration needs to work with our allies and the United Nations to produce an understandable strategy that will address the reconstruction needs of Afghanistan, while sharing the costs among all countries that have an interest in the peace and security of that nation. The future of Afghanistan is an important national security issue for the United States. Discontent is being sown in Afghanistan by al-Qaida agents, and if order again breaks down in Afghanistan, we can bet that terrorists and extremists will try to take advantage of the situation. If Osama bin Laden is still alive, which recent reports seem to indicate, I am sure that he is looking forward to the failure of U.S. and allied efforts to bring security and stability to Afghanistan. If we are to head him off at the pass, the first thing we need to do is have a clear plan of action. While the President seems eager to use military force against Saddam Hussein, I urge him first to take care of the unfinished business in Afghanistan. The situation is crying for his attention. The Senate has passed a bill to authorize funds to address the problems in Afghanistan, but it is up to the President to show the leadership that is needed to prevent the situation in that country from further deterioration.

Mr. BYRD. Madam President, last year when my beloved little dog Billy passed away, many people came to me to express their condolences. It was like losing one of the family. My wife and I have shed many tears over little Billy. There is never a day that I don't pass his little box of ashes that is sitting up in my bedroom, never a day that I don't touch that little box and think of little Billy. He has been with us 15 years. We have a new dog now, one which is a very sweet little female dog. She is a lap dog. She is a Shi Tzu, a dog that came out of Tibet. It was bred to be a lap dog in the palace, extremely friendly, knows no person is not a friend. She just smothers my wife's face with kisses-- and mine, too. So we love her. But I said to Erma the other night: Erma, if Billy could come back tomorrow, would he still be No. 1? And both she and I said yes; even though we love this little dog, the little dog we have now, the female--she is called Trouble; I think my wife saw me coming when she named the little dog Trouble. I said to Erma, if Billy came back tonight, would he still be No. 1, and she said yes. And we both agreed that Billy would still be No. 1. Last year, when our beloved dog Billy Byrd passed away, many people came to me to express their condolences. But one who really, really touched me was a big, hulking Navy combat veteran who came to my office and showed a personal compassion in that moment of sorrow. That person came to talk about the little dog that I had lost. He had read about the passing of our little dog Billy. He read the story in the newspaper, and he came to my office to express his sorrow. Who was he? That person was the senior Senator from New Hampshire, Mr. Robert Smith. He would make about two of me, Robert Byrd. Here he came to my office, took his own busy time to come to my office. This was back in April of this year. He came to my office, paid a special visit to my office to tell me how sorry he was to hear about my little dog Billy. So once again, as I have many times in my long years with which God has blessed me, I came to realize that the people with whom we work here in the Senate often have a personal side that we do not get to know or understand in our working relationships on the Senate floor. Our colleagues are usually much more complex than their public persona would lead one to believe and have facets to their characters that are not often seen in their daily official activities. But Senator Robert Smith's thoughtful expression of sympathy gave me a better understanding and appreciation for this man who for several years now has proudly represented his State in the Senate. He is on the Armed Services Committee with me. I have served on that committee now with him these many years. Senator Smith possesses an admirable quality of perseverance. As a young man, he had to work his way through college. Although he was the son of a naval aviator who was killed in combat during World War II, when Robert Smith was old enough, he enlisted in the Navy and he proudly served our country in combat in Vietnam. He is a person who had to run for Congress three times before being elected. As a Senator, his tenacious adherence to his independent ways eventually cost him his Senate seat. He has often been portrayed as a fierce conservative, but I came to perceive him as the ``citizen legislator'' that he promised to be when he was first elected to Congress in 1984. In his twelve years in the Senate, he has been a forceful advocate of the many and various causes in which he believes, and he has never been deterred by the labels others may place on those views. Bob Smith's politics is not easy to characterize, from his support for a constitutional amendment to balance the budget to helping to preserve and protect our environment, he has defied easy labels. Senator Smith has also been a strong advocate for modernizing his state's and the nation's infrastructure, and for that I sincerely applaud him. He has also tenaciously fought to gain a thorough accounting of American MIAs and POWs. I have probably opposed Senator Smith more than I have agreed with him, but I have consistently been impressed with his independence of spirit and thought, and his dedication to the causes in which he believes. I am confident that in his future efforts he will continue to demonstrate the steadfastness, courage, and integrity that he has exemplified during his twelve years in this chamber. I wish him well in his future endeavors. I hope he will, indeed, come back and visit those who are his colleagues of this date.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Absolutely, yes.