Thomas Coburn

Mr. COBURN

Mr. COBURN. Madam President, I ask that the pending amendment be set aside to call up amendment No. 1738.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, this amendment is very similar to an amendment we voted on in the small business bill which passed 64 to 30- something--I can't remember the exact number. It is very straightforward. We ask the OMB to look at the two most recent GAO reports, combine $10 billion worth of savings, and send back to us a recommendation so that we can, in fact, accomplish that purpose. The GAO is showing us exactly where we need to go in terms of saving money. We are involving the executive branch in that. They also have other plans they are working on and on which I am trying to work with the administration. If you want to pick up the difference between what we really need to do for infrastructure in this country, the best way to do it is to support this amendment and go for another $10 billion in infrastructure. I yield the floor.

Mr. COBURN. Madam President, the CBO just announced this morning that February was the largest deficit month in this country. We have run $690 billion worth of deficits through the first 4\1/2\ months of this fiscal year. We will have a $1.6 trillion deficit. This amendment the Senate has voted on before passed with 64 votes the last time it was voted on. It is a very simple, straightforward amendment. Before I get into the details of this amendment--we need a highway bill. Everybody agrees with that. This is the Senate, and the right to offer amendments has been secured, finally, after 2 weeks of negotiation. Where are we as a country? I think it is interesting to look back from fiscal years 2011 to 2001. In 2001 the total bill for the Federal Government was $1.86 trillion. It is now almost $3.61 trillion. In 2001 we had a surplus. Now we have a $1.3 trillion to $1.6 trillion deficit coming into this year. I think the American people would like to see us do something about that. Yet, at every turn, on every occasion, we have not risen to the challenge of creating an environment where jobs can flourish. One of the reasons is the Federal Government is squeezing the jobs out of the economy by taking such a large segment of them. This amendment is very straightforward and very simple. The GAO, through two reports now--one released just this last month and a second in a series of three which will become annual--has told Congress where the problems are. The problems are in continuing to do the same thing in multiple programs and multiple agencies. They have outlined billions, hundreds of billions--I can calculate at least $100 billion worth of duplication that they have outlined and said we didn't do anything about it last year when they gave us the first report. Now they are giving us another report that has probably another $30 billion or $40 billion worth of savings for the American people because of duplication. So this amendment asks--it is very straightforward--it asks OMB to look at the GAO reports and give recommendations to us on what they would recommend that allows the executive branch to participate in terms of $10 billion worth of savings this year on duplication. Why is that possible? Here is why it is possible. And this is just a small sample of what GAO has told us. We have 209 different programs spending $4 billion through eight different agencies to encourage science, technology, engineering, and math education in the United States. Can anybody in this body defend the fact that we have 209 different programs? No. Nobody will even stand and defend it. So we ought to be able to--there is nothing wrong with us wanting to encourage that, incentivize that, help create that, because we know that is for a higher powered workforce in the future. But 209 programs? Why wouldn't we streamline it? We have 200 separate crime prevention programs. As a matter of fact, the GAO said you have enough duplication just in the Department of Justice programs--they spent $30 billion over the last 9\1/2\ years-- that if you would eliminate that duplication, you would find billions to save. How do you get rid of a $1.6 trillion deficit? The way you get rid of it is a million here, a billion there, $10 billion here, $15 billion there, a billion here. What this amendment would do is save us $10 billion this year through smart government. It does not question the motivation. It does not even question whether it is our authority. But it says: Let's do this. The Senate voted 64 to 36 when this was brought up in April of last year--the same amendment. They thought it was a good idea. The reason they voted for it was because it was fresh on their minds, what the GAO had told us. Let's take some others. The Surface Transportation Program. Here we have the highway bill. They did, thankfully, eliminate a few programs. We still are going to have 100 programs involved in surface transportation even when this highway bill is completed. We did not do what we needed to do. We can do better and we can save money. Even if the same amount of money gets out to the American public, the administrative cost will shrink dramatically. Private sector green buildings. We have 94 separate programs, 16 different agencies to incentivize green buildings, and not one of them has ever been tested to see if it has an effect, whether it is positive, whether it is efficient, whether it is effective--not one. Never. Why would we have 94 separate programs for green buildings? We have 88 different economic development programs. Why? Nobody can answer the question ``Why?'' As a matter of fact, 2 months ago, I offered an amendment on this floor that asked of us to have the CRS tell us before we pass a new bill whether we are adding another duplicative program. Because that was a rule change, it required 67 votes, and 40 of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle said: We do not want to know whether we are creating another duplicative program, so it only got 60 votes. It required 67 and, therefore, we are not doing it. So we are going to ignore the brains, we are going to ignore the knowledge, and we are going to continue to produce and create duplicate programs. Teacher quality. This is one of my favorites. We have 82 separate teacher training programs run by the Federal Government, not for Federal teachers, for State teachers. Eighty-two separate programs, and not one of them has been tested to see if it is effective or efficient, whether it has value, whether we actually get anything out of it, whether there is some teacher improvement coming out of it--and that is run from seven different agencies. First of all, why would you have any teacher programs other than at the Department of Education? Yet we have 82. Nobody can tell me why. Nobody will stand on the floor and defend the fact that we have 82. Because they realize it is the height of stupidity. It is stupid to do multiple programs in multiple directions and waste the overhead. We are not talking about not sending money. We have 47 job training programs. We are in the midst of releasing a report on all the job training programs as to how they affect Oklahoma, and I will tell you it is not a pretty picture. There is so much waste, so much ineffectiveness through those 47 different job training programs. We are spending $19 billion of Americans' money every year and we are not getting a billion dollars' worth of benefit out of it. But nobody wants to do the hard work, nobody wants to stand and defend those 47 job training programs, but nobody wants to eliminate them either. We have a real problem. This is a first step, a first amendment, where we can make this bill--by the way, we are having trouble paying for the highway bill. We are going to pay for it--2 years' worth of highway spending--with 10 years' worth of reductions. This amendment alone, if we pass it, will pay for the highway bill differential between the trust fund and what the EPW Committee says we ought to be spending on highways--this amendment alone. So when somebody comes down and says they are not going to vote for us to eliminate duplication, you have to ask why. Why is it we would not want to eliminate duplication? Why is it we would not want to become efficient and effective in terms of how we spend not our money but our children's money? Because 40 cents--38 cents this year--of every $1 we spend we are tacking on to a decreased standard of living for our children in everything we do. So tell me why somebody would not want to get rid of some of the duplication, would not want to do the commonsense thing that every one of the rest of us in our own personal lives does, all our State governments do, all our personal businesses and all our public companies are doing: doing more with less every year? The easiest way to do that is to consolidate and eliminate duplication. So when you see the vote today, if it does not get 60 votes, what should the American people learn from that? Here is what they should learn: It is not about gridlock. It is not about partisanship. It is about incompetence and a lack of thoughtful consideration for the people who will follow us. This is easy stuff to do. We have hard stuff we have to do in our country. We are going to be making tons of hard decisions over the next 2 or 3 years. Everyone in this body knows it. They will keep kicking the can down the road, hoping they do not have to be involved with the very tough decisions we are going to have to make. This is the easy one. This is easy. I would ask my colleagues to consider this. If you voted for it in April of 2011, I would appreciate your vote again. If you do not vote for it, I would ask you to reconsider why you are here. Are you here to perpetuate waste? Are you here to perpetuate incompetence? Are you here to protect some constituency's little small program that does not work yet wastes your children's future? This is an easy amendment to vote for.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. COBURN

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I submit the following notice in writing: In accordance with Rule V of the Standing Rules of the Senate, I hereby give notice in writing that it is my intention to offer an amendment to the Standing Rules of the Senate, by proposing Amendment No. 1737 to S. 1813.

Mr. COBURN

Mr. COBURN. This is a simple, bipartisan amendment, and we have voted on an identical amendment before, 63 yeas, 33 nays. My colleague, the Senator from Colorado, has been gracious enough to support this amendment. This is straightforward. We just need to know what we are doing when we do it. It requires the CRS to show us if we have duplicated anything before a bill comes before the Senate. I yield to my colleague from Colorado.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. COBURN. I have the greatest respect for my chairman on homeland security. I love him dearly. GAO has already told us we are not doing our job. The first study of the Federal Government showed $100 billion worth of duplication. The second study is coming. CRS will have this easy because GAO will have already shown them where all the duplication is.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I rise to express my concerns about amendment No. 1483 to the STOCK Act. While we all oppose public corruption and recognize the need for tough laws in this area, I believe this amendment may blur the line between innocent behavior and criminal public corruption offenses. This amendment expands the Federal criminal gratuities statute to cover the gift of anything of value, over $1,000, that is given to a public official simply because of their status as a public official. A unanimous Supreme Court in United States v. Sun-Diamond Growers of California interpreted the honest services law to require the government to actually prove a link between the thing of value given and the specific act. The Court said the thing of value must be given ``for or because of'' an official act. I am concerned that expanding the crime to include items given merely on the basis of the public official's status goes too far and criminalizes some legitimate conduct. However, my primary concern with this amendment is the section that gives the Federal Government the authority to interpret, prosecute, and enforce State and local laws. I believe this provision violates the basic principles of federalism embodied in our Constitution. Amendment No. 1483 expands the definition of ``scheme or artifice to defraud'' in Federal criminal law to include the ``undisclosed self-dealing'' of an ``officer, employee, or elected or appointed representative, or person acting for or on behalf of the United States, a State, or a subdivision of a State, or any department, agency or branch of government.'' The amendment defines ``undisclosed self-dealing'' as an official act that furthers or benefits a financial interest of the official or certain family members and associates of the official. Undisclosed self-dealing also occurs when the official knowingly falsifies, conceals, or covers up material information that is required to be disclosed by any Federal, State, or local statute, rule, regulation, or charter or the knowing failure to disclose material information in a manner that is required by a Federal, State, or local statute, rule, regulation, or charter. Thus, this provision makes it a Federal crime for a State or local official to fail to comply with a State or local law, including the mere filing requirements of State or locality. This provision gives the Federal Government the power to enforce State and local laws. I do not believe our Founders intended for Federal prosecutors to be able to bring Federal criminal cases against State or local officials based on that official allegedly breaking or failing to comply with a State or local law, and the Founders did not intend for Federal judges and Federal courts to be interpreting the State or local laws, expect in limited circumstances. Corruption of State and local officials is a serious problem, but it is not the Federal Government's problem to solve. For these other reasons, I oppose this amendment in its current form.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. COBURN. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. COBURN

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, this is another good government amendment. If we want to restore confidence, this is something we should do. It says before we vote on a bill, we are going to have at least 72 hours to read it. It is going to be available online with a CBO score so that when we cast a vote, we actually know what we are casting a vote on and we actually know how much it costs. It just says it has to be online for 72 hours. In other words, we get the privilege of reading the bills we are voting on, and we also get the privilege of knowing the financial costs of the bill or at least an estimate of the financial cost and what that will entail. This transparency is designed to make the Senate better. If we want to build confidence with the American public, then the way we build confidence is to assure them that we knew exactly what we were doing when we cast a vote, not guessing at what the consequences and the details of that legislation are. For many pieces of legislation right now, what we have seen in the last 2 or 3 years is there was no time given, no capability to study the legislation to make improvements, and many of the pieces of legislation came without the ability to modify it. If we cannot read the legislation, then we cannot amend it. What does that tell us about the legislative temperament and thoughtfulness of the Senate? We cannot read it, we don't have time to contemplate and consider it, and we cannot amend it even if we could. That doesn't have anything to do with the Senate as it was designed and has functioned for the last 170 years. It has everything to do with politics today rather than the best long-term interests of the country. Amendments like this have gained a large amount of bipartisan support and have had the support in the past when we voted on it, although we have not acquired the 67 votes that have been necessary in the past to pass it. The cosponsor of this amendment is Senator McCain. He understands the importance of reading what we pass. All of our colleagues do. Why not put in the self-discipline that we have to rather than the political moment that says we have to vote on this whether we know anything about it or not? During the health care debate, eight of my colleagues sent a letter to review the health care legislation. They ultimately voted for the health care legislation. Their request was to give them 72 hours to read the legislation. The legislative text and complete budget scores from the Congressional Budget Office of the health care legislation considered on the Senate floor should be made available on a Web site the public can access for at least 72 hours prior to the first vote to proceed to the legislation. Why shouldn't the public be able to see what we are doing 72 hours before we do it? Just as important, why shouldn't we be able to know what we are doing before we vote so it is straightforward, commonsense, and transparent to the American public as well as to our colleagues in the Senate that now we have the time available to read a piece of legislation contemplated and hopefully have the opportunity to improve it. What is the goal? The best long-term outcome for the country. Amendment No. 1476 Mr. President, I would ask that the pending amendment be set aside, and I call up amendment No. 1476.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the amendment be considered as read.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, this amendment would provide a complete substitute for the STOCK Act. It requires Members and staff to certify that they have not used inside information for private financial profit. In other words, they are going to make an affirmative statement under the law that they have not violated section 10b of the Securities and Exchange Act. All Members would be required to sign the following statement on an annual financial disclosure form: I hereby certify that the financial transactions reflected in this disclosure form were not made on the basis of material nonpublic information. The STOCK Act does not create new restrictions for Congress against insider trading. We all know that. Those restrictions are there. There are no new restrictions. We don't change the restrictions at all. The SEC has stated that the Members of Congress and staff are already subject to insider trading laws. They just need some clarity with that. They also would like to have timeliness with that. In fact, all Americans are subject to these laws, including the Senate, found primarily in section 10b. This provision restricts anyone who trades stocks from using material nonpublic information to profit financially, and Congress is no different from anybody else. The STOCK Act was carefully written to carefully reaffirm that Congress is not exempted from these laws, and I believe the chairman stated that just a moment ago, which we would include in this. As such, the bill brings no new reforms to the table nor does it create any real expectation that behavior will change. It just requires paperwork filing. All Members and relevant staff should have to certify they are not trading on private information. Each year every Member and certain high-salaried staff are required to disclose their financial holdings. Senate rule 37 also already prohibits any Senator or staff from conflicts of interest. That would be a conflict of interest. Specifically, rule 37 prohibits the receipt of compensation by virtue of influence improperly exerted from his position as a Member or officer or employee. So we are covered doubly. We are already covered under rule 37, and we are covered under section 10b of the Securities and Exchange Act. If, in fact, somebody fails to do this, then they will be liable under the False Statements Act in title 18, section 1001, which makes it a crime to lie to Congress. Section 1001 prohibits anyone from knowingly and willfully making any material false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement to the government. The punishment for violating the False Statements Act is a fine and a prison term up to 5 years. This does not mean that someone who makes a good-faith effort but mistakenly forgets something will face punishment. Yet any Member who knowingly signs that form in error will be liable for making a false statement on his or her finances, carrying large penalties. I think efforts to reestablish trust in the Congress are important. I disagree with my colleagues that this is one that will make a difference. It won't. Nothing materially changes other than a paperwork requirement. Nothing materially changes other than having to report every 30 days instead of annually. What is the real problem? The people of this country do not have confidence in Congress because Congress does not address the real issues of the country. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I would make a couple points. One, we already file all our stock trades--correct?--every year.

Mr. COBURN. Every change in every investment we have, we file every year. We already do that. We are already under rule 37 of the rules of Senate Ethics, which forbids any conflict of interest action that would benefit ourselves. That would include inside information to trade stocks. There are 5 to 10 times as many senior executive positions within the administration than Members of Congress that, in fact, this same thing should apply to. If the important thing is ``within 30 days,'' my hope would be the chairman and the sponsor of the bill, Senator Brown, would give very clear instructions to the Ethics Committee on how this is to work. Because I will note for you, last year 16 Senators got a 90-day extension on their filings with the Ethics Committee. That is 16 percent. We have to have some vow to make sure we do not put the Members who are absolutely innocent of anything in a corner because they cannot timely respond to this bill. So my hope is--and I will finish with this; I know Senator Brown wants to speak--looking at the timeliness of the filing I think is important to still accomplish what you want, but not make it so rigorous that people are going to fall out of that. We all know how things get busy here, how we come in, we come out. We are traveling, and we have all these things we are responding to. It will be difficult for many Members to comply with the 30 days. My hope would be you would look at that, and you would also look at rule 37 of Senate Ethics because, in fact, we are already doubly covered. We are covered under 10b. And I do not have any problem with modifying my amendment to say we are covered so you cannot have a defense to say you are not. But we are also covered under rule 37, which forbids any conflict of interest under which you would benefit personally. With that, I yield the floor and thank the chairman of the committee.

Mr. COBURN. Well, I have plenty of those. In fact, I will do better-- I will give you a Zantac.

Mr. COBURN. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, as my colleagues are no doubt aware, I stand in opposition to this bill, not because I think we should have insider trading. As a physician I am trained to fix the real problem and you are treating the symptoms. Several months ago, CBS did a series and showed some questionable, not necessarily insider trading, stock transactions, which, given the low level of confidence by the American public in this institution, have raised the question: What about insider trading? I honestly believe everyone in our body is never going to use insider trading to advantage themselves over the best interests of our country. But the real problem is the confidence in the Congress to do what is in the best long-term interest of the country. The reason the confidence is not there doesn't have anything to do with insider trading as we would normally think about it. It has to do with insider trading that we do not normally think about, as to how we sell a vote to get something else on the next vote, how we trade a position, how we saw positions were bought and sold on the health care bill. Whether it be the Cornhusker Kickback or the Florida Gator-aid, whatever it was, the fact is the American people saw behavior of Members of Congress doing things that were politically expedient rather than what is in the long- term best interest of our country. That is the real insider trading scandal we ought to be addressing. How do we do that? The way we address that is bring to the floor bills that actually address the problems our country is having today. Every second of every day this year our Government will spend $121,000. We will borrow $52,000 a second every day. We are not addressing any of that in the Senate. We did not all last year and we are not this year. The real problem in front of our country is America does not see a Congress that is willing to address the real issues and make the hard choices. Hard choices are coming. We will make those choices ultimately. Some of us will not be here. But the longer we delay in making those very difficult choices--such as saving Medicare, such as saving Social Security, such as reforming the Tax Code to stimulate economic activity and create job opportunities for Americans--that is what they want us doing. The other thing I will mention is I was one of two people who voted against the last ethics law. I ask my colleagues, did we improve the Senate with the last ethics law? Will we improve the quality of representation with this law? I do not think so. I think what we are doing is playing a political game to say we are all guilty, now we have to prove that we are not. That is not what our system of law is built on. Our system of law is built on the fact innocent until we are proven guilty. The assumption that the Senate is undertaking now is that some of our colleagues are doing insider trading on the stock market. Nothing could be further from the truth. The real insider trading is the horse-trading that goes on in this body that is not always in the best interest of the country. This legislation is not about to earn back the trust of the American people. The SEC and the Ethics Committee already have the power to investigate inside trading abuses. Yearly we fill out a report saying: Let's deem every trade we have made. If it is true what the chairman of the committee said that what the SEC would like to do is have it more refined so they can have better access, then that ought to be the bill we bring forward. We ought to bring forward a bill that says: No. 1, we are under the laws of the SEC, section 10b, and we are. We don't hear that said anywhere, but we are. If our intent is to bring forward a bill to fix the potential for insider trading, then that is what we ought to be doing. But the assumption we are guilty first and have to prove we are not by making a notification every 30 days of any trade that somebody makes for us--we may not have even been involved, but we have a fiduciary that we asked to trade for us, and then we are going to have to make that representation. Has anybody asked the question: What happens if you do have inside information, have no involvement whatsoever in a trade because you put it in a trust account for yourself, but it is still being traded and they happen to coordinate at the same time? Are you guilty of insider trading or are you going to spend $50,000 to $100,000 proving that you are not guilty? This is a fine institution. It can be better, but it is best when it fixes the real problems, not the symptoms of the problems. Amendment No. 1473 to amendment No. 1470 Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that amendment No. 1473 be called up.

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that my amendment No. 1476 be modified with the change to the instruction line only. I am just doing some housekeeping on that.

Mr. COBURN. I would make one other point, and I am not trying to put my chairman in the hot seat, but nobody in this Chamber can name somebody right now who is trading on inside information. I believe that is a true statement. Yet we are changing the law not because anybody has done something wrong but because we are struggling to try to get people to think we are doing things right. There is nothing wrong with that as long as we are not going to entrap our colleagues. The question I have is, if we can't name somebody and if there is not factual truth, what we are really putting the Senate on notice for is that, by the way, you are assumed to be trading on inside information now, and therefore we must do this to ensure that you are not. Well, I don't believe anybody in this body is doing that. And when we put our Members in that position by changing the law to, for example, 30 days-- if I have three stock tradings and I miss it by 1 day, what is the consequence of that filing and of this bill? What is going to be the penalty that comes out of the Ethics Committee for missing it 1 day or missing one of the three trades because you didn't know? We have lots of questions that are not answered. I can tell my colleagues that many Members of this body have spent a lot of their personal money defending themselves on accusations that were absolutely untrue before the Ethics Committee, and that should be addressed and clarified in the body, the report language, of this bill. I have no doubt this bill is going to pass in one form or another. I understand I am in the very slim minority of people who think it is unnecessary because I think the law already applies to us, and I also don't think we have a bunch of cheats working in the Senate. But would the Senator agree through the Chair that we ought to make clarification of everything we can so we know what the ultimate results are or are we going to leave that up to the lawyers on the Ethics Committee? What are we going to do with that? Are we going to determine what the penalties are for late filing or an accidental omission? What is going to be our direction to the Ethics Committee in this regard?

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I have one more question for the chairman. If, in fact, this is what we should do--and I think the body is going to agree this is what we should do--does not the Senator think this should apply to the administration as well, the executive branch, that this should apply the same 30-day rule to every member of the executive branch? You talk about real knowledge of inside information, they have it. We do not have it. They have it. Why would this rule not apply to-- no matter who is President--executive employees in the administration?

Mr. COBURN. Through the Chair, would the chairman accept that modification to my amendment, that we would, in fact, establish positively that Members of Congress are under rule 10b of the Securities and Exchange Commission? Would that give the Senator less heartburn?

Mr. COBURN. This is a bipartisan amendment. This amendment is sponsored by Senator McCain, Senator McCaskill, Senator Udall from Colorado, Senator Burr, and Senator Paul, as well as myself. This is a straightforward amendment. We have asked for this multiple times but have not gotten it. What this amendment says is, every bill that comes before Congress and to be considered by the Senate should determine whether it is duplicating something that is already happening in the Federal Government. It is common sense, and all we are saying is to have an analysis by the CRS, Congressional Research Service, to determine if the bill creates a new Federal program, office, or initiative that would duplicate or overlap any existing Federal program, Federal office, or initiative with a similar mission, similar purpose, similar goal or activities along with a listing of all the overlapping duplicative Federal programs or offices or initiatives or initiative. Now, why is that important? Last February the GAO brought to us the first third of the Federal Government and outlined to us $200 billion worth of spending on duplicate programs. They gave it to us. It was held as a great thing. Now we know we have all of these areas: 82 teacher-training programs, 47 job-training programs, 56 financial literacy programs, and on and on. They brought that to us, and we all said that was good. The problem is we didn't do anything about it. If we want to restore confidence in the Congress, do something about the problems that have been identified already. This is a good government policy that says before we act on a new bill that we actually will know what we are doing, and we will have checked with CRS, and they will tell us if we are duplicating again something that is already happening now. One of the other amendments we should pass is to have every agency give us their list of programs every year. Do you realize there is only one agency in the Federal Government, one department, that actually knows all their programs? There is only one. It is the Department of Education. They are the only ones we can go to and find a list of all of their programs. The rest of them don't know it. There is no catalog. They have no idea. So before we pass a new piece of legislation, we ought to at least have the help of the Congressional Research Service, and we ought to pass good legislation that doesn't duplicate. It may be a well- intentioned piece of legislation, but because we, as a Congress, have failed in our oversight responsibility, we don't know that it is duplicative when we bring it to the floor and pass it in the Senate. All I am asking is, let's do a doublecheck, especially in the time of trillion-dollar deficits. We ought to do a doublecheck and make sure we are not duplicating something that is already happening. That is important for a second reason: If we don't know we are duplicating something, that means we are not ``oversighting'' what is occurring right now, the program or the office or the initiative that is out there now, if we don't have knowledge of it. Rather than create a new program, it might give us the opportunity to fix one that was well-intentioned but is not working. So this is a good government amendment that is bipartisan that says: Let's do this before we pass additional legislation. But let's know what we are doing. It is complete and it is thorough. It also will provide greater transparency for both us and taxpayers regarding the impact of the legislation we are passing. Some may say: What if we have an emergency? This has a clause in it that says if it is an emergency, that requirement is waived. So if in the case of an emergency we need to do something, we will waive the requirement that we have to look at CRS to see if there are duplications. So it is a commonsense amendment. I would hope my colleagues will support it, and that we can, in fact, actually fix the real problems not the symptoms of the disease. Amendment No. 1474 to amendment No. 1470 Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the current amendment that is pending be set aside, and I call up amendment No. 1474.

Mr. COBURN

Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I submit the following notice in writing: In accordance with rule V of the Standing Rules of the Senate, I hereby give notice in writing that it is my intention to offer an amendment to the Standing Rules of the Senate, by proposing Amendment No. 1473 to S. 2038.