Bob Corker

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. The Senator from Rhode Island has talked about science, as the Senator from Oklahoma has mentioned, and I say I agree with him, that the large body of science says that man is contributing to global warming. As a matter of fact, I will even give to the Senator from Rhode Island the fact that cap and trade may be a legitimate way for us to deal with this. I think everybody in this body knows I am very open to looking at a legitimate cap-and-trade bill. What I would ask the Senator from Rhode Island is--and I know he knows this subject well; he and I were in Greenland together and I know his beautiful wife Sandra actually swims daily in the bay that he is talking about, so she knows well about those temperatures. I know they discuss this at great length. But if, in fact, we have this issue to deal with, why isn't the issue itself, by itself, good enough for us to focus on it? Why is it that we create a bill that--instead of focusing on cap and trade and lowering emissions in our country, why is it instead that we create a bill that brings trillions of dollars into the United States Treasury and then pre-spends that money from the year 2012 to 2050? Why would we do that? Isn't the issue by itself strong enough? This is the mother and father of all earmarks. I have no understanding why anybody in this body would support legislation that prescribes trillions of dollars of spending. Secondly, why would the Senator from Rhode Island support a bill where 27 percent of the allocations that are worth trillions of dollars--why would he support a bill that actually transfers those allocations which, in essence, is a tremendous transference of wealth to entities that have nothing whatsoever to do with lowering carbon emissions? Why would he support a bill such as that? Again, I have seen a lot of people walking around here with nicely tailored suits and briefcases, and I know that they realize if they sit at the table, they are going to benefit themselves by being tremendously enriched in the process. But why would the Senator not support a cap-and-trade bill that returned the auction proceeds to the people of America who are going to be paying higher costs legitimately as a result of this bill? The last piece--and this is one that is very difficult for me to understand. Why would the Senator from Rhode Island--my friend, whom I love serving with--support a bill that pays and sends U.S. companies-- instead of spending money here in our country on technology that lowers emissions here, encourages them to spend billions and billions of dollars in China that benefit that economy when we have tremendous trade deficits today? So what I would say is again--I will say it over and over--I respect the authors of this bill. I agree with the science. I think we are squandering a tremendous opportunity in this body, because we are using old-time politics to win support for legislation that ought to be good enough on its own, and in the process the American people are paying the tab. I think it is reprehensible that we are going about it in this fashion. I think today with gasoline prices at $4 a gallon, we have an opportunity--I think this is a perfect time to talk about this bill to marry responsible climate security with responsible energy security.

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I thank the Senator from Oklahoma. I say to my friend from Rhode Island--would the Presiding Officer let me know when I have a minute left?

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, that was not the understanding Senator Inhofe had left me with. However, I respect the Chair. If that is the ruling, then I do not object. I thank the Senator from California for her courtesy in giving Senator Enzi his remaining time.

Mr. CORKER. I thank the senior Senator from Tennessee. I will only take a moment. I enjoy so much working with the Senator from Pennsylvania. We came in at the same time and I appreciate the points he made. I actually wish to more fully address the comments made by the bill manager, the Senator from California, and say that I don't see any crocodile tears coming from this desk. The fact is, we will be offering meaningful amendments that focus on this legislation, with no excuses. I know the senior Senator from Tennessee has been in the forefront of this issue for some time. I think all of us realize that while gasoline prices have increased no doubt over the last 7 years, no doubt this bill will cause gasoline prices to continue to increase. I think there is a big discussion about what we do with the revenues generated by this bill. That is a legitimate argument. We all realize there is a tremendous transference of wealth that takes place in this bill. All we are trying to do is cause this bill to be more pure and at the same time to try to link it toward energy security. I am looking forward to the amendment process. I thank the Senator from Virginia for adding so much to the tone of debate we are having here. I yield back my time to the Senator from Tennessee for not only rebuttal but his comments about the bill itself.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. First of all, this bill, in black and white, prespends over $1 trillion with no congressional oversight. The Senator from Virginia is right on the one portion to which he was referring. We can either veto it or approve it, but we have no say-so on how those technology moneys are spent. I object to the comment about me being a Johnny-come-lately. I have been very transparent about this legislation. I have authored three very detailed amendments, sent them to every colleague in this Senate, and have given the background to them. I have been totally transparent throughout this process. I have made public presentations about the three amendments that I think would make this bill far better--things that people call poison pills. I think the Senator knows I certainly have not come to this debate at a late time, and I plan to offer those amendments.

Mr. CORKER.--and not cause this to be a burden on Americans as it is by prespending trillions of dollars.

Mr. CORKER. I will take my time back.

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, if I could, I think what they have asked for is 3\1/2\ minutes plus 4 minutes, for 7\1/2\ minutes. The Senator from Pennsylvania, whom I admire and respect--I have sat here many times waiting for every Senator on this floor to speak. This is an important topic, and I hope he will allow Senators on the other side of the aisle to have a little discussion right now for 7\1/2\ minutes, and then we will stop.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I was in my home State last week, and I can tell my colleagues that the American people have a very low knowledge of this bill, certainly the vocabulary in it. I think 30 hours that we will spend on this floor talking about a bill that is so important--so important to the environment, so important to energy security, at a time when gasoline prices are where they are, combined with the fact that people care deeply about the environment--is most appropriate, and my guess is that we are going to have a lot of technical amendments using language that most people in this body do not use. We are going to be talking about an auction process that has never been put in place in this country, an allocation process that will be allocating trillions of dollars to people around this country. I think for us to spend 30 hours talking about that so that all Senators are fully aware of what this bill says prior to voting on amendments is most appropriate. I would think that people who have spent a year putting this bill together would relish the time to talk about what this bill actually does and what it says. I look forward to being a very active participant in that. I thank the sponsors for bringing this forward.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I wish to say that portions--while no doubt we have the original text, it is my understanding negotiations were taking place throughout the night. I was getting e-mails at 1:30 in the morning regarding the negotiations, and yet I have seen no written copies of any of the agreements that have been made. I would say that would be nice to see prior to a markup of this type, but again out of respect I will not object, and thank you very much for this colloquy.

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, the bill the chairman of the Banking Committee, the distinguished Senator from Connecticut, is speaking about is over 400 pages long. It has been amended verbally numerous times over the past week. We are going to have a meeting at 3 o'clock today. None of us has seen the bill. None of us has seen the amendments. I have tremendous respect for the chairman of this committee. He is, to me, one of the best Senators in this body to work with. I respect the ranking committee member. I know time is of the essence, if you will, as to addressing some of the issues that are in this bill. I am very disappointed that today at 3 we are going to be going through a very technical bill many Senators in this body, candidly, may not ever take the time to look at because of the technicalities that exist and the specialties that will be addressed, if you will, by this bill. I am very tempted to object to this, not because it is taking place today at 3, but because of the fact that we do not have any of the documentation regarding the agreements that have been made. Out of my respect for this chairman and out of my respect for the ranking member, I will not object at this time. But I will say, in the future I hope for a technical bill such as this that is more than a few lines--something that is over 400 pages long--there will be time to actually go through the bill prior to a very strenuous markup. I in no way assert any negativity toward the Senator. I know he is doing the best he can to hold this bill together. I know there are a lot of competing interests. It is actually out of respect for him trying to do the job he is doing today, in order to move something forward in this body, that I will not object.

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, reserving the right to object.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Yes.

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside.

Mr. CORKER. I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, with the approval of the senior Senator from Massachusetts, at the appropriate time I will send to the desk an amendment to the pending legislation we are discussing. What this amendment would do, in the spirit actually of what our distinguished Senator from Massachusetts said, talking about giving States the ability to do what they wish after this legislation passes, in that same spirit, what this amendment would do is actually give each State or political subdivision the ability within 1 year of enactment of this legislation, should it pass, to be able to override that and not have this legislation apply to their State or to their political subdivision. I think this is very much actually in keeping with many of the statements the Senator from Massachusetts made. I hope this amendment passes. Let me say, in giving a background to this, I was a mayor of a city. I don't think I will ever have a job that I loved more than being the mayor of a city, working with citizens right there with the problems they have to deal with, nor do I think there will ever be a group of people I respect more than the firefighters and the men and women of our police departments who serve us so well. Like many people here, I have attended funerals of policemen who have lost their lives in the line of duty. I have attended retirements and other meaningful events for firefighters who spent their entire life giving public service to our cities. I don't think there is anybody in this body who respects more what firefighters and police men and women do in their line of duty to protect each of us and deal with us. But I have also had to deal with those issues at the local level where we have to balance a budget, the same thing at the State level, something we here in Washington don't have to do. We don't have the financial constructs that local municipalities and States have. They actually have to deliver. I find it almost ironic that here in Washington we are going to mandate to the States, we are going to mandate to cities all across America, how they should go about dictating labor agreements in their own cities and States. This is a tremendous overreach by those of us at the Federal level. I have yet to hear a good policy reason for this to be in place. States and cities throughout our country, should they decide to incorporate collective bargaining in the area of public service, can do so if they wish. This legislation certainly deserves defeat in its present mode. I hope this amendment, as it will be presented tomorrow, can be accepted and at least cause this legislation to give back to States and cities the right to determine their own destiny as it relates to negotiating with people who work in firefighting and police departments all across the country. With that, I ask unanimous consent, again, to send the amendment to the desk.

Mr. CORKER. If it is OK to continue, I will.

Mr. CORKER. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, it is always an honor to be in the presence of the senior Senator from Tennessee who does such an outstanding job in this body of promoting bipartisanship. I know the Presiding Officer has played a big role in that. I thank you for that. I want to say I came here as did the Senator to solve big problems for our country in a bipartisan way. I just left a meeting that I think exemplifies that to the highest level, where Ron Wyden and Bob Bennett are cosponsoring a great piece of legislation in a bipartisan way, to solve the tremendous health care crisis our country is dealing with today. I am proud to be part of that and to join them in a bipartisan way to solve this major problem. I know many of us are doing the same thing to focus on the energy issues that are before us as a country. That is what I came here to the Senate to do. I know that is exactly the reason, Madam President, you came to the Senate. That is why today I rise with tremendous frustration over the actions of our majority leader. I have enjoyed working with our majority leader, and he certainly has done a good job in many instances. But, today, strictly on a politically motivated basis, in a letter to the senior Senator he stated he is not going to confirm TVA appointees because they are not Democrats. We went through a tremendous amount of effort, or this body did prior to me being here, to make sure the TVA board was a professional board, that people there were able to make decisions in the best interests of that body and all the many people who are served by the TVA facility. These two nominees are outstanding human beings. They have served their State, their cities, and our country with great distinction. Bishop Graves is someone who recently was heralded here in Washington because of his tremendous leadership in making sure that the racial divides that have been a part of our country were swept away. Susan Williams has done the same, has been a leader in many other ways, in business, and both of them have helped shepherd TVA through some of the finest years TVA has had. Both of these are reappointments. In other words, they have already served as part of the TVA board, which recently has been expanded geographically to bring in other States, which is a very good thing from the standpoint of board representation. Both of these members were approved unanimously by EPW, again a bipartisan effort, which I might say also is controlled by the Democratic Party. So I have to tell you while it is frustrating to me to see this body become a proxy in some cases for the Presidential races, I hate to see some of the things we deal with as a result, and that diminishes this body. I will tell you that our leader taking this position is a tremendous disservice to this body; diminishes this body. I hope the leader will come to his senses, will realize that not only is he doing something that is of tremendous harm to TVA, it damages this body for the majority leader to act in such a politically motivated way. I hope very soon these nominees will be reappointed. I hope TVA can get about its business in serving the people of Tennessee and other surrounding States in a proper way. I hope the majority leader again will do the right thing, will cause these nominees to come to the floor. I am sure they will be unanimously confirmed. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I rise today, while business is slow in the Senate, to send my strong congratulations to the University of Tennessee Lady Vols who again excelled and set an example for our country in the way they conducted themselves. Pat Summitt has a tremendous legacy in our State. She is someone who not only is an outstanding coach and has won eight national championships, but she also teaches players life examples and ways to be successful later in life. Our students who play on the Lady Vols team are steeped and focused on academics and being successful later in life. The way she has led the Vols and led our State by her actions and the way this team has excelled is something to be congratulated and certainly makes all of us in Tennessee and in our country proud.

Mr. CORKER. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I wish to congratulate the dance teams at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and the University of Memphis, who each won their second consecutive Division I-A national title at the Universal Dance Association College Nationals in January. Each team worked relentlessly over the holiday break in order to defend their 2007 national titles, practicing up to three times a day-- and the hard work certainly paid off. The University of Tennessee squad was ranked first in the Jazz division after the semifinal round, while the University of Memphis squad topped the hip-hop division. Both teams continued their flawless performances in the final round, captivating the audience and comfortably securing their spots on top. The University of Tennessee Spirit Program is the only Division I-A program in the country to place in the top three in the dance, cheerleading and mascot divisions. In addition to their national title, the Tennessee dancers placed fifth in the hip-hop division. The Tennessee mascot, Smokey, also clinched a national title, his first since 2001. The Volunteer Cheer Squad placed second. The University of Memphis Spirit program had a strong showing as well. The Memphis dancers took home seventh place in the Jazz division while the Tigers' All-Girl squad took home a Division I national title, and the Co-Ed Squad placed fourth in Division I-A. I would also like to congratulate Tennessee head coach Kelley Eidenmuller and Memphis coaches Carol Lloyd and Frankie Conklin for their outstanding work with these groups of dancers. It is an honor to represent the great State of Tennessee and these extremely talented and dedicated young people. I extend my heartfelt congratulations to these athletes for their tremendous accomplishments.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I raise a point of order that this amendment violates section 204 of S. Con. Res. 21.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Six or seven.

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, it sounds like it is going to be a long night. I hope you have some relief coming. But I wish to thank the Senator from New Hampshire. I rise today to talk about the budget that is getting ready to be put forth. I do not wish to talk specifically about this budget. But having gone through this process once before, it is obviously a very undignified process we are getting ready to enter into tomorrow, where we will have 30, 40, 50, maybe 60 amendments to a budget, many of which are set up solely to send messages, cause people to vote on things that might make them look good in the next election so that 30-second ads might be generated. I do wish to say I have tremendous respect for our budget chairman and ranking member. I think they are outstanding leaders in the Senate. I realize they are dealing, if you will, with the process that has been set forth in the Senate. I think they both exercise their duties very diligently. I know there are differing points of view as to how we might deal with this next year's budget. Let me say in general I think this entire process is not what it ought to be. It is, to me, a great disservice to our country the way we handle our budgeting, and appropriations processes that follow. I wish to talk about a couple things as it relates to this issue. First of all, I know one of the amendments that will come up tomorrow will be the DeMint amendment relating to earmarks. It is an amendment I will support because I do believe earmarks have gotten way out of control in the Senate. I do not believe people who earmark necessarily in any way are doing bad things. I think it is actually an outcome that has been generated due to processes breaking down in the Senate. When various Senators want to see road projects go forward or other things that are needed, they have now sort of sidelined the processes we ought to be going through, which requires planning and responsibility on our part--a little bit of discipline. Instead, now we have moved to this very cumbersome and, I will say, most inefficient earmarking process. I think that is not a good thing. I realize, in essence, in the Appropriations Committees earmarking pots are set up and allocated based on numbers of things, in most cases having nothing to do with the priorities of our country. I do wish to say that while I support this amendment in the hopes that together somehow or another through a moratorium this year on earmarks we will begin to look responsibly at ways of funding--funding infrastructure, funding projects that are very needed in our country--that is done so on merit and with oversight, I do not believe that solving the earmark problem in any way is going to deal with our overall budgetary process, nor with the appropriations process that follows that. As a matter of fact, I worry sometimes that we talk so much about earmarks that we feel like if we were to solve this earmark issue--and the American public, I think, is beginning to buy into this--we would solve all the financial woes this country has. Earmarks--as bad as I think they have gotten out of control and need to stop--do nothing of that sort. It is a small piece, very small piece, in a bigger picture that needs to be solved. As a matter of fact, I hope at some point all of us in this body will realize how ridiculous the processes are that we go through and realize we are not in any way dealing with the longer term issues our country faces. One of those things I would like to see us do--I know there is an amendment that has been brought forth before: the biennial budgeting process, where we would actually look at the budget in a 2-year process. I know Ranking Member Judd Gregg has brought forth such an amendment--I am a cosponsor of that amendment--so that in the odd years we are actually allocating resources and in the even years--election years--we are actually doing oversight and making sure we are spending money wisely. One of the things in the process we go through right now that I think we are totally blind to is the tremendous entitlement tsunami that is getting ready to face our country. I think most people realize we as a body are not dealing with that issue. For us to even be down here passionately debating amendments over a budget and not dealing with that, again, does not serve the country well. I think everybody knows we have huge problems that are coming up in the future. Let me give a little bit of a picture of that. Today, if you took in all the money we have set to come in over the next 75 years and then looked at the liabilities we have toward Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, we have $66 trillion in unfunded liabilities. Yet tomorrow you are going to see us on the floor haggling over amendments that, at the end of the day, will have no effect whatsoever on this huge problem we have to deal with in the very near future. To put that in perspective, today if you looked at the entire net worth of our country, it is only $57 trillion. So because of the Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid entitlement issues, we have a greater unfunded liability than the entire net worth of our country. I think that is a pretty big issue. To put that in perspective, since our Government was formed a couple hundred years ago, we have taken in during that entire time only $42.7 trillion in revenues. So, Madam President, I look forward to coming tomorrow and going through an exercise--an exercise that I realize will have some impact, if you will, on the amount of money we spend on various programs. Then I realize at the end of the year we will have an appropriations process. Then, during that period, unless we are able to have a moratorium on earmarks, we will have another 10,000 or 15,000 earmarks that direct money out in various places. But I know in the process of all that occurring, we still will not have dealt with the major issues this country has to deal with. I hope somehow this body will have the courage, in a bipartisan way, to come together and deal with this issue. I strongly support the Gregg-Conrad amendment that would cause this body, in a bipartisan way, to bring forth solutions to this problem--to this entitlement problem--in a manner that can only be voted on up and down, with no amendments, so we as a body, hopefully, will have the courage to deal with the real issues our country has to face as it relates to fiscal issues. Madam President, I yield the floor.