Bob Corker

Mr. CORKER

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, this last March, 64 Senators--32 on each side--wrote a letter to the President asking for real tax reform and real entitlement reform. I think most of us know today's exercise is a political exercise. It is not intended to deal with deficits. It is intended to divide. Last week, I heard the President speaking at a college in Florida about the Buffett tax. In that speech, he was talking about spending all that money on things they were interested in. In other words, this money is not being used, per the President's speech, in any way to reduce deficits. I encourage all those on both sides of the aisle--32 Senators on each side--who have spoken earnestly and sincerely about progrowth tax reform and entitlement reform to not follow this folly of division but to hold together, as we need to do something that is great for our country. It is my hope that by later this year--possibly in a lameduck, although I hope something happens sooner than that--all of us who truly care about solving problems, not about scoring political points, which this bill is about, will come together and do something great for our country. I yield the floor.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, today I rise to speak about the subject our Nation is focused on as the Supreme Court takes up some of the constitutional provisions of the health care law that was passed a couple of years ago in this body. Obviously, the courts will decide whether the law that was passed is constitutional. There are a number of challenges. That will take place by the end of June, according to what we hear. Secondly, there is an election process underway where the candidates running for the Republican nomination have talked about the things they will do in the event they are elected as it relates to the health care bill. I want to talk about the fact that regardless of the Supreme Court and regardless of what may happen in the electoral process, I have yet to meet a person on either side of the aisle--and maybe today will be the first time--who believes this bill can work as it was passed. What that leads me to say is that regardless of what happens, I think most of us are aware that the financial data that was used to put together this bill is flawed, and the fact that it is flawed, it will not work over the longer haul. For the same reasons I railed against the highway bill for breaking the Budget Control Act we just put in place last August, I voted against this bill--the fact that we used 10 years' worth of revenues and 6 years' worth of costs, which greatly exacerbates the problem in the outyears; the fact that we took $529 billion in savings from Medicare to create this problem and yet left behind the issue we deal with in this body almost every year and a half, which is the sustainable growth rate that we deal with with physicians; and then, thirdly, the fact that we placed an unfunded mandate on States. The State of Tennessee has actually been highly progressive as it relates to health care. In the State of Tennessee, dealing with citizens who are in need, we created a program called TennCare. It went through lots of problems but over the last several years has been functioning in a stable way. But what this bill did was mandate to the State of Tennessee that in order to keep the Medicaid funding that funds TennCare, the State has to, on its own accord, match Federal grants with over $1.1 billion in costs. So from 2014 to 2019, what this bill does is mandate that the State of Tennessee use $1.1 billion of its own resources to expand the Medicaid Program to meet the needs this bill has put in place. This is the point of my being on the floor here today. Again, I do not know of anybody here who believes this bill will cost only what was laid out as we debated. As a matter of fact, we have had so many people--the McKenzie Group and others--who have laid out how many private companies in our country will basically get rid of their health care and put people out on the public exchange. And the cost of that is going to be tremendous. Our own former Governor, a Democrat, who has spent a lot of his lifetime in health care on health care issues, projected that the State of Tennessee, if it decided that it wanted to put its own employees out on the public exchange, could save $160 million--by putting its employees away from its own health care plan and out on the exchanges. Obviously, I doubt that is something States are going to do. But his point is this: In a free market system, people are going to respond based on what is best for their company and what is best for their employees. If you look at the subsidy levels that this bill lays out--up to 400 percent of poverty--they are massive subsidies. We are talking about people who are earning over $78,000 a year. So when you look at the subsidies this bill has put in place, what employers are going to quickly find, especially because we put a subsidy in place on the one hand and on the other hand, because this bill lays out the type of coverage companies have to have in place--there are attributes that cause those costs to rise, and we have already seen that happening throughout our private sector; I think that is undeniable--what is going to happen is the companies are going to say: We would be better off paying the $2,000 penalty. Our employees get these massive subsidies, by the way, that are paid for by all taxpayers in America. What that means is that there are going to be far more people on these public exchanges than ever were anticipated when this bill was being put in place. My point is that the bill, when it was being constructed, used 10 years' worth of revenues and 6 years' worth of cost, and that made it neutral. Anybody can see that in the outyears that is obviously going to create a tremendous problem, a fiscal problem for this government, for our country. But the problem is that when it was laid out, the amount of people who were then thought would go on the plan was much lower than is actually going to be the case. Again, I think what you are going to see throughout our Nation, if this bill stays in place as it is, is a massive exodus by private employers from the health care business. What that is going to do is put them on these public exchanges with the subsidies, and, in fact, what it is going to do is drive up the cost even more than people ever anticipated. So this is my point. There is going to be a Supreme Court judgment this June. None of us knows what it is going to be. We have pundits on the left who say they are confident the bill is going to stay in place. We have pundits on the right who say they are confident, constitutionally, it is going to be overturned. We will have an election in November that may change the course of history as it relates to this bill. Even if those two events have no effect on this bill, I wish to come back to my base premise, which is that there is no possible way this bill is going to work as it was laid out during the debate. There is no way the projections that were laid out as to what the cost of this bill is going to be are going to be what the actual costs are. What I say is, regardless, this body is going to be pressed with replacing this legislation with something that makes common sense. There was actually a lot of bipartisanship, prior to us passing this piece of legislation, about what those commonsense measures should be. We ended up instead with something that was far more sweeping, something most Americans find offensive, something that, no question, will cause this Nation tremendous fiscal distress. My point is, yes, we are going to be watching this June as the Supreme Court rules. Yes, we are going to pay attention to the elections in November. Regardless of those outcomes, it is my belief this body will have to come together and put into place a different piece of health care legislation that actually fits the times and the American people and allows the freedom of choice the people are accustomed to and is built on premises that will cause our country to be fiscally sound. I stand ready to work with people on both sides of the aisle when that time comes to make that happen. I yield the floor.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, today I wish to honor an exceptional Tennessean and fellow Chattanoogan for his outstanding career as a newsman and his many contributions to our city and country. Lee Stratton Anderson was born in Trenton, KY in 1925 to Mr. and Mrs. Herbert L. Anderson. At the age of 5, he moved to Chattanooga, TN, where he still resides today. In 1942, as a high school junior, Lee was hired as a reporter at the Chattanooga News-Free Press, and on April 18th of this year, he will retire from that same newspaper 70 years to the day his storied career began. It was clear from an early age that Lee Anderson was an exceptional person dedicated to serving others and his country. In addition to becoming a journalist at 16 years old, Lee earned the distinction of Eagle Scout and was the winner of two Sons of the American Revolution Good Citizenship Awards. After high school, he enrolled in the University of Chattanooga and volunteered for the Air Force aviation cadet program, serving 21 months on Active Duty in World War II before returning to school and to the paper. He maintained a busy schedule as a college student, arriving at 6:00 a.m. to the paper each day before heading to class until 9:30 p.m. Remarkably, he graduated in 3 years while still finding time to be a leader on campus. He was president of Sigma Chi fraternity, the Blue Key Honor Society, and the Interfraternity Council, and chairman of the Honor Council Indoctrination Committee, all while holding a full-time job. At the Chattanooga News-Free Press, Lee covered politics and the State legislature before being named associate editor in 1948 and then editor in 1958. It was as an associate editor that Lee began to write the editorials that would become his signature. Over 40 years later, when Walter Hussman bought and merged the News-Free Press with then- rival the Chattanooga Times, Lee was named associate publisher and editor of the combined paper. The Chattanooga Times Free Press remains the only U.S. newspaper to offer two editorial perspectives, and, at age 87, Lee continues to plan three or four editorials for the Free Press section of the editorial page each day. His editorials have been reprinted in publications throughout the country, garnering him numerous awards, including the Freedoms Foundation's national award for editorials in 1979. In addition to his 70-year career in the newsroom, Lee Anderson's contributions to his community, State and country have been just as impressive and valuable. He is a retired major in the U.S. Army Reserve and has served on a number of committees focused on educating the public about the Civil War. In 1957, he cofounded Confederama, now known as the Battles for Chattanooga Museum, an educational tourist attraction re-creating local battles and highlighting Chattanooga's role during the Civil War. He has delivered more than 2,000 speeches on a variety of topics, including religion, history, and politics, and authored two books: ``Valley of the Shadow: the Battles of Chickamauga and Chattanooga, 1863'' and ``Israel: I looked over Jordan.'' Lee has held leadership positions in numerous civic causes and organizations, including the Chattanooga Downtown Rotary, the Chattanooga Convention and Visitors Bureau, and the local chapter of the American Red Cross, to name a few. This past year, Lee was named the public face of United Way's annual campaign after almost 80 years of continuous participation with the charity, making his first contribution as a first grader. He also served Tennesseans for 4 years under my good friend, then-Governor Lamar Alexander, on the Tennessee Industrial and Agricultural Development Commission. Lee Anderson's many achievements in life are too numerous to list here, but if you were to ask him, he would tell you after his wife, Betsy, of 62 years, two children and two grandchildren, one of his greatest accomplishments has been teaching Sunday school for over 40 years at First Presbyterian Church in Chattanooga. Mr. President, I have known Lee Anderson for my entire adult life and have seen firsthand his love for our community and witnessed his contributions to making it a great place for our citizens to live and do business. Over his long career, Lee's views have always reflected his strongly held beliefs and deep devotion to the city and country he loves. It is an honor and a privilege to serve in the Senate on behalf of Tennesseans like Lee Anderson. I congratulate him for his remarkable dedication to the newspapers of record in Chattanooga and join with so many others in thanking him for the lasting impact he has made, which will extend for many years to come.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, in December, with the distinguished leadership of the Senators from Vermont and South Carolina, we passed the National Guard Empowerment Act as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act with truly bipartisan support, as evidenced by its 71 cosponsors here in the U.S. Senate. At the time, we said that the National Guard has performed extraordinary service in the last 10 years alongside their Reserve and Active Duty counterparts as part of a truly integrated total force, but that the changes included by the National Guard Empowerment Act were most important not because of the great work in the past, but because of the essential need for enhanced cooperation in the future. The Senate recognized that enhanced capabilities for the National Guard, particularly elevating the Chief of the National Guard Bureau as a statutory member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, this Nation's highest military planning body, were essential to meeting the threats of the future. And today I am happy to join my friend from Delaware to recognize two men who played a key role in advocating that point of view here in the Senate, two men who approached an idea widely regarded as a nice, but unlikely thought and helped transform it into a reality. They are Chairman of the National Guard Association of the United States NGAUS, MG Frank Vavala, and his highly capable ``battle buddy,'' the president of the NGAUS, retired MG Gus Hargett. People around Tennessee know Gus Hargett as the former Adjutant General of our State's National Guard, but also as the person responsible for supervising the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency and the Tennessee State Guard. They also know Gus as the kind of guy to get things done when they really matter. Throughout his career he had a healthy mixture of active duty service with the U.S. Army and the precise sort of duty with the National Guard at the state level or Active Guard Reserve status that we put GEN Craig McKinley on the Joint Chiefs of Staff to strategize for. With the support of General Vavala and Adjutant Generals around the country, General Hargett provided key guidance for this legislation, answered countless questions, and provided the needed impetus to take it over the top and onto the President's desk. He recognized that this transcended simply advocating for the National Guard, it was an essential step for preparing our country's homeland defense strategy.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, pursuant to section 904 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 and 4G3 of the Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act of 2010, I move to waive all applicable sections of those acts and applicable budget resolutions for purposes of my amendment and ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. CORKER. This is the amendment, as modified; is that correct?

Mr. CORKER. We have to offset discretionary spending by $11 billion.

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, the whole Nation watched last August as our Nation almost shut down over a debt ceiling vote and a very good law was put in place. Senator Reid has called it stronger than any budget resolution we have ever had. We agreed during that vote that what we would do is raise the debt ceiling but lower discretionary caps over the next 10 years in order to lower the deficit. We had language regarding a budget resolution. Unfortunately, last week we overrode that, but the fact is this bill violates the Budget Control Act we put in place just last August, 7 months ago. For this bill to be truly budget neutral, as was outlined in the spirit of this bill as it was-- --

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, later today I will be down on the floor to offer a budget point of order on the highway bill. I have been down here several times over the course of the last several days. I think most in this body--a large majority of people in this body-- have been a part of encouraging us to, in a very bipartisan way, solve the budget problems we have in this country. There were 64 of us--32 on each side of the aisle--who signed a letter to the President encouraging him to really adopt some of the principles that were laid out in Bowles-Simpson. After that, there was a very large number of Senators on both sides of the aisle who signed a letter to the supercommittee asking them to go big and really deal in a serious way with the budget issues, the deficit issues with which our country is dealing. I have been down here multiple times talking about the various oddities in this bill. What is getting ready to happen in this bill is that we are actually, over the next 2 years, going to create a $10 billion to $11 billion deficit. Because of the various gimmickry we use, we are figuring out ways to get around that. One of the budget gimmicks we are using in the bill is that we are going to spend the money over a 2-year period but pay for it over a 10-year period--2 years worth of spending, 10 years worth of revenues. I think the Acting President pro tempore was here during the period of time we had the health care debate in our Nation, and many of the folks on my side of the aisle, rightfully so, were concerned about the health care bill because there were 6 years' worth of costs and 10 years' worth of revenues, and a lot of people thought that was a budget gimmick. Candidly, many of my friends on the other side of the aisle, while they may have supported the bill, were also concerned about those same types of gimmicks being used in the health care bill, and it caused them concern. My point is, in a bipartisan way, we have tried to deal with our budget deficits in this country. I notice the Senator from Illinois just stepped on the floor. He has been a major player in those initiatives. What we did last year was we passed something called the Budget Control Act. We did so in order to raise the debt ceiling and to accomplish discipline in this body so that over the next 2 years we established overall caps on spending. This bill, believe it or not--here we are in March, with a very popular bill, which speaks to the fact, to me, that it is the kind of bill that many of us would think, if you really want to pass a highway bill, you would prioritize it higher than other spending, that it is the kind of situation that, in a bipartisan way, we would come together and say: OK, we really want to see infrastructure spending in this country, so let's make this of higher priority than other spending. That is not what we are doing. Believe it or not, this Senate--which has talked big about deficit spending, written lots of letters, had lots of meetings--what this Senate is getting ready to do with this bill is violate the Budget Control Act that we passed last year trying to show the American people we had at least a modicum of discipline. Let me say it one more time. This highway bill, in March of this year--I think we passed the Budget Control Act last August, in the early part of August, to demonstrate to the American people that this Senate, this Congress had the discipline to put caps on spending over the next 2 years to begin the process of addressing deficit reduction. What we are going to do, if we pass this highway bill, as laid out, is violate that budget cap right now. I want everybody in this body to know that I plan to offer a budget point of order. I hope at least all of those 64 Senators--32 on each side--would join me in opposing breaking the Budget Control Act we just put in place in an effort to demonstrate to the American people and, candidly, to the world that buys our Treasury bonds that we have the ability, the discipline to deal with the fiscal issues we have in our Nation. Mr. President, I know we have the distinguished Senator from Texas in the Chamber, who was to speak exactly right now. I yield the floor and thank the Acting President pro tempore for the time.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, the fact is, the amount of money it would take to not have a budget point of order is so small that we ought to just offset discretionary caps for this year by the amount we are spending above that for this highway bill. It is ludicrous that we cannot set priorities in a way that calls us to live within the Budget Control Act and break it within 7 months of passing it and break faith with the American people. I yield the floor. Several Senators addressed the Chair.

Mr. CORKER. Just 30 seconds.

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, let me first say I am a very strong supporter of a highway bill and of infrastructure but also believe we should have integrity as it relates to this issue of spending. Last August, the world and the country watched as our Nation almost came to a halt, and we agreed, in order to raise the debt ceiling, we would pass the Budget Control Act, which puts strict limitations on spending for last year and this year. We are making a mockery of what happened during that time if we waive this Budget Control Act point of order that I have put in place. Basically, what we have said--and we have had all kinds of Senators on both sides of the aisle who have focused on the deficit issue in good faith, but what we basically are saying is we cannot make it 7 months without violating the Budget Control Act which we put in place to create discipline in this body. I urge a ``no'' vote on waiving this motion.

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I rise to speak about the highway bill. I want to start by first thanking the chairmen and ranking members of the EPW Committee, the Commerce Committee, and the Banking Committee, all of whom worked to put in place some reforms this bill reflects. There is a component of this bill, though, where work has not been done in a satisfactory manner, and that is actually paying for this bill. The Senator from North Carolina, who is in the chair, has been involved in many discussions about deficit reduction. We have had, ad nauseam, meetings about how to get our spending under control. Last year, after Erskine Bowles, from her State, and Alan Simpson came together with the Bowles-Simpson report, there was a pretty big effort in this body to try to adopt the principles laid out therein. As a matter of fact, 32 Republicans and 32 Democrats sent a letter to the President asking him to embrace those principles. Later on there was another effort by a supercommittee that was put in place. Numbers of people on both sides of the aisle wrote letters asking that this supercommittee do something outstanding for our country and reduce the deficit by $4 trillion, if possible. My point is that there has been a lot of bipartisan effort toward reducing the deficit. Yet the only thing we have done thus far--the only thing that had any meat on it at all was the Budget Control Act, which was passed on August 2. The Budget Control Act was passed in a trade, if you will. At that time, the country's debt was beyond the debt ceiling that was allowed by law. So in order to raise the debt ceiling, there was an agreement reached by this body to lower the amount of spending that was going to take place over the next 2 years by an equal amount. We passed on August 2 of last year the Budget Control Act. That act laid out specifically what we were supposed to do to be responsible in reducing our spending. Again, this is something that was passed in a very bipartisan way. As part of that process, because we have not passed a budget in some time, there was a budget resolution--there was a deeming process that was put into place as part of the Budget Control Act. Chairman Conrad laid that down right after the fact, and we are governed by that deemed resolution in this body. Unbelievably, we have this very popular program. The highway bill is something people on both sides of the aisle strongly support. I want to see a highway bill. I was the mayor of a city, and I understand and know how important highway infrastructure and transit spending is to this country. Unbelievably, with a very highly supported bill, what this body is doing is already violating the spending levels that were deemed by virtue of the Budget Control Act passing and a budget resolution that came thereafter. What I say is that this body already--7 months after this Nation, and actually the world, watched as we wrestled with our debt ceiling--they watched us pass the Budget Control Act. They knew it had a deeming process that took place, where a budget resolution was deemed. We are already in violation of that. All I am doing is asking the Members of this body--so many of us, in a bipartisan way, have risen and said we have to do these things to get our spending under control, to control deficits. So many of us took tremendous heat in voting for this debt ceiling that took place last August. Yet to this body, in passing a very popular bill that we would think would cause us to want to prioritize and say: OK, we do need to spend money on highways, so therefore let's spend less on something else, this is a very important piece of legislation. I thank the chairman of the EPW Committee for the reforms that have been put in place and the way their committee worked in a bipartisan way. These comments this morning have nothing to do with the work the EPW Committee did. The fact is, we are not paying for this piece of legislation in the appropriate way, per the guidelines we laid down as a part of the process put in place by the Budget Control Act. To me, that is absolutely irresponsible, especially when you look at the spending levels that are above that deemed budget resolution. So at this time I want to offer a point of order. I know the chairman is back, and I have been filibustering slightly until she got here. Madam President, the pending measure, S. 1813, as amended, will exceed the aggregate level of budget authority and outlays for fiscal year 2012 as set out in the most recent budget resolution deemed by the Budget Control Act of 2011; therefore, I raise a point of order under section 311(a)2(a) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.

Mr CORKER

Mr CORKER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that amendments Nos. 1785 and 1810 be made pending en bloc.

Mr. CORKER

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

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I rise to speak regarding the highway bill. We each come into work daily with different thoughts. I come in today very hopeful. The fact is we have a bipartisan bill that hopefully will actually have the finance component of it on the floor soon. We have had it worked through the various committees of the Senate--the Banking Committee, the Commerce Committee, the EPW Committee. I think what this body is waiting for right now is the Finance Committee package, and I know they are continuing to work on that package. The reason I come down here, in a very hopeful way, is I think all of us support the highway bill. We want to see a bill such as this passed. But I think we also want to see it passed in an appropriate way, and some of the earlier renditions that have come out of the Finance Committee, unfortunately, have not paid for this bill. It is my sense that maybe what is happening right now is that there is some work being done to try to make that not the case. I know the Senator from New York is familiar with the health care debate we had years ago, and one of the issues many of the folks on this side of the aisle were concerned about--and I think many folks on the other side of the aisle were concerned about--was some of the gimmickry used to pay for it. We had 6 years' worth of spending and 10 years' worth of revenues. Obviously, people around the country-- rightfully so--were concerned about that. What we have at present with this highway bill is something that is even worse than that. We have 2 years' worth of spending and 10 years' worth of revenues to pay for it. Everybody in this body knows there is no family in New York and no family in Tennessee who could possibly survive under that scenario. I had an op-ed published this morning in the Washington Post talking about the fact that we have had so many bipartisan efforts here to try to deal with deficit reduction. We had the Bowles-Simpson report that came out; we had 64 Senators--32 on each side of the aisle--who wrote a letter to the President to encourage him to embrace deficit reduction and progrowth tax reform. We had another group of colleagues who became involved in something called Go BIG, and the whole focus was to deal with the fiscal issues of this country. I come in somewhat hopeful this morning, but what I fear is happening is because this highway bill is so popular that Members on both sides of the aisle are willing to kick the can down the road in an area where we could--in a bipartisan way--address deficit reduction and get the highway bill on a spend-as-you-go basis, meaning that we pay for it as we go--instead of doing that, because this is an election year and this is a popular bill, both parties--instead of leading on deficit reduction--are going to cave in and basically kick the can down the road because this is ``a popular bill.'' To me, that is not what the American people sent us to do. So we have this opportunity to pay for it. I don't know whether we are going to get where we need to go. As a matter of fact, even though I am hopeful we are going to make progress on this issue, I don't think we are going to quite get there. I sense in this body a desire to kick the can down the road, to turn our head, to not live up to our responsibilities as it relates to this bill. So I am going to offer two amendments. One amendment would say: Look, we have a highway trust fund. We have had the transfer of $34 billion or $35 billion into it from the general fund since 2008. We have a trust fund. We ought to either spend the money that comes into it accordingly and reduce the amount of spending on highways or what we should do is lower discretionary spending someplace else. Again, we have not seen the final bill because another negotiation is taking place. It appears to me, in order to live up to our responsibilities to the American people, that what we would have to do is cut about $11 billion or $12 billion out of the discretionary caps we agreed to as part of the Budget Control Act to make this appropriate. I will offer an amendment once we see what the final package is that does just that. In other words, if we all think highways and transit bills are important--and by the way, I do. I used to be the mayor of a city. I know that infrastructure is very important to our economic growth in this country. But if we believe spending on highways and transit is important and it is a priority, then what we need to do is lower discretionary caps and lower spending in another area. For us to do anything short of that would be making a mockery of the American people and certainly making a mockery of the arrangement that was created through the Budget Control Act. So I am certainly hopeful this amendment will pass if we continue on this course. I can't imagine that in a bipartisan way both sides would show the irresponsibility that has led to today anyway. I am still hopeful that by the time we pass this highway bill, we will have come together and acted responsibly and actually paid for this. But I think the American people understand that passing a bill that spends money over 2 years and tries to recoup it over a 10-year period is a highway to insolvency. So I am committed more than ever to us living up to our responsibilities to the American people. I believe there is something brewing in this body that says we have to live up to these responsibilities. I think the best place for us to start is on this highway bill. I will close with this. I know the Senator from Utah wishes to speak for a few moments also. A lot of people are saying: Senator Corker, this is such a small amount of money; and, gosh, this is such a popular bill--everybody likes it. Can't we just turn our heads on this issue and kick the can down the road and do something we know fiscally is totally irresponsible because all of us like highways? My response is, look, if we cannot deal with the highway bill that, by the way, is just simple math--this isn't something such as Medicare reform or something else where we have all kinds of moving parts that are very difficult to deal with--the highway bill is just simple math. If we don't have the ability in this body to deal with just addition and subtraction, there is no way the American people are going to trust us with things such as Medicare reform and Social Security reform and making sure those programs are solvent down the road for seniors who depend upon them. So what I would say to this body is we have a great opportunity this week and next week to show the American people we are serious about getting this country on a solid footing. There is no better place to do that than on a popular bill. In other words, if we have to make priorities, if we have to make choices, if we have to cut spending in other places to make 2 years' worth of payouts equal 2 years worth of income, there is no place better to do it than on the highway bill. I urge this body to stand tall, to meet its responsibilities, and only pass this bill if it is paid for over the same amount of time that it is extended. So that means all the money that goes out is paid for over the next 2 years. I will be offering amendments to do that if the Finance Committee does not in and of itself. I thank my colleagues for listening, and I yield the floor.

Mr. CORKER

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

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I have come to the floor to talk about a topic I spoke a little bit about yesterday. I know all the focus right now is working on a solution to some of the things going on between the House and the Senate. I know that is what people are focused on today. I understand that probably sometime tomorrow there will be a vote on the highway bill, which is expected to fail, and then it is my understanding there will be some amendments brought forth to bring a finance bill, an EPW bill, a commerce bill, and a banking bill together that will actually be debated and, it is my sense, will ultimately pass, but that after the recess is over we will come back and deal with that. I wish to speak to that topic now. I know I am beginning to sound a little bit like a broken record on this, but we have had so many people down here on both sides of the aisle who have actually worked together, for a year and a half after the Bowles-Simpson report came out, on long- term deficit reduction, progrowth tax reform, and entitlement reform, and there seems to be a real seriousness about that issue. I think all those who have signed letters in support of it were very sincere. Yet I think what we are finding with this highway bill, in spite of the changes that are likely to take place with the finance component, is that what we are ending up with is a situation where we have 2 years' worth of spending that is taking place and we are using 10 years' worth of pay-fors. I can tell you there is no one in this body who likes infrastructure more than me or has spent more time on the back of a paving machine or on a screed. Those are the kind of things I love to see happening. I know they create jobs and tremendous economic growth over the long haul. But I know the Presiding Officer remembers the debate we had for a long time in this body over health care, and I know he remembers the tremendous discussions that took place on the floor over the financing mechanisms. I don't think there is any question that people on my side of the aisle railed strongly--I might say as they should have--over the fact we had a pay-for formula where basically we were spending money over a 6-year period and paying for it over 10. Ultimately, the bill passed, but there was tremendous divide in this body over mostly just the budget gimmickry that took place. Yet what I see getting ready to happen, in a large bipartisan way, is we are going to vote for a highway bill, possibly--I am not going to do that--that spends money over a 2-year period and recoups it over 10. I am actually stunned by this. We talk about all the things we need to do in this body regarding Medicare and how we need to focus on reforms that make sure seniors in Vermont and seniors in Tennessee have these programs down the road, and we talk about Medicare in the same light. I think all of us want to make sure Social Security is here for future generations--for these young people in front of us. All of us know we have to figure out a way to solve that problem. The highway bill is simple. It is just math. It is unlike Medicare, it is unlike Medicaid, and it is unlike so many of the things we deal with around here that are so complex to get it just right. We have a highway bill that is not complicated. It is just math. There aren't all kinds of moving parts, as far as people providing health care and the incentives that are in place. But it feels to me like what we are getting ready to do as a body--and I hope this is not the case--is to pass a highway bill where we are going to do exactly what we have done with the sustainable growth rate for physicians in Medicare. Back in 1997, we passed a bill here--I wasn't here at the time--that basically created a mechanism for paying physicians who dealt with seniors, and the formula was flawed. So what we have done every 18 months or every year is cause the medical community to be panicked and seniors to be panicked over whether this is going to be extended because the sustainable growth rate, as it was put forth, was going to call for huge reductions in payments to physicians. We are actually dealing with that right now. It is one of the issues we are trying to work out with the House. What we did was to create a cliff. So every time we deal with this issue it gets more and more difficult to deal with it because we will not just sit down and do the long-term reforms on that one component that need to happen. We keep taking from Peter to pay Paul. We keep wrestling with this issue but we will not deal with it. What we are getting ready to do with the highway bill is basically inject that same poisonous formula into the highway bill. What we are getting ready to do is to pass a highway bill that will fund highways through 2013, but at the end of that period of time we will have the same kind of cliff that we deal with regarding the SGR. We will have a $10 billion shortfall, instead of just dealing with a funding formula. If we don't think we are spending enough on infrastructure and people want to offer that in some way, now is the time to do it. Otherwise, if people don't want to go into a deficit situation, what we ought to do is spend the amount of money that is coming in. But it feels to me as if we are getting ready, in a very bipartisan way, when we get back from recess, to show the country it is ridiculous to think this Congress will deal with the kind of reforms to Medicare to make it solvent, to do the kinds of things we need to do with Social Security--both of which are more complex--because this Congress will not even deal with this little program. It is a very important program, very important to my State and I am sure to Vermont. But we will not even deal with the reforms to it, in this time of great concern about our fiscal situation. Again, I strongly support infrastructure funding. But I think what we will show the country, if we pass a bill like this, in a strong bipartisan way, is that there is very little hope Congress will ever deal with the more complex issues that challenge this country and which cause many seniors in our country to be concerned, which cause taxpayers to be very concerned, and certainly cause future generations to wonder whether this body is ever going to deal with the issues they know will haunt them down the road. I came down to speak on this. I have done it daily in the lunch meetings we have with our own side. I just hope that sometime over the recess period, prior to coming to the floor, the Finance Committee will come up with a different package that actually either pays for this bill by offering funding formulas--which, by the way, is just math, it is not very difficult--or where we spend the amount of money that is actually coming in. I will say that if we spent just the base moneys that are coming in, States such as Vermont and Tennessee and other places have the ability, if they choose, to generate gasoline taxes in their own States and do things with road money. Candidly, the way this program works, I think most people know that citizens send up $1 and they get back 98 cents. So it actually could be a more efficient way for this to work than sending it up to us and letting us get our hands on part of the money and figuring out what we are going to do with it. I do believe this is one of the most irresponsible things we can do, especially when there may have been some criticisms over the President's budget. I haven't heard a lot of people speak on it because I don't think it has been taken up as a document that we will debate on this floor in a real way. But it is difficult to criticize the President's budget. I know the vote on last year's budget was 97 to 0 against it. But it is very difficult for people on either side of the aisle to criticize the President's budget if, in fact, there is a large bipartisan desire to pass a highway bill that does exactly the same thing. I hope the Finance Committee will meet again and come up with a solution to this. It is not urgent. We have a recess period that is coming up. Surely, this Congress, this Senate, can show the ability to deal with an issue such as this, which, again, is so simple, and demonstrate to the American people, in a bipartisan way, that we have the ability to begin looking at these programs that are so important to people across our country in a way that doesn't take us down the fiscal tube. I thank the Chair for listening. I know it is tough when there is not much happening down here. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CORKER

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

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I thank the Chair for his leadership. I am here today to appeal to this body. I think the Presiding Officer, I know myself, and a whole host of folks in this body have been concerned about where the country is going. I know many of us have talked about ways of reforming our Medicare system at some point, which I realize may not happen this year, and our Medicaid system, and to move our country to a place where it works fiscally for all Americans. We have talked about all kinds of things. Shoot, I think there have been over 50 or 60 Senators involved in trying to reach consensus on those issues. Today, we are debating a highway bill. I know we have had a lot of great work that has taken place in EPW, a lot of great work in the Commerce Committee, in the Banking Committee, and in the Finance Committee. What we have done in this bill--and I so appreciate our leadership allowing us to look at this bill in this way--is to move to one portion of the bill and then adding other portions on to the bill. So I thank the leadership of the Senate for letting us look at the bill in this way. I know there are provisions in the Finance component that are being worked out now before the Finance piece comes to the floor, and again I appreciate the people working on that. But it was my understanding--and I think I am right--that the major components of that Finance work were not supposed to change, yet here we are and what we are getting ready to do with this highway bill is pretty unbelievable. All of us want to see infrastructure in this country built. I know the Senator from Maryland is a strong proponent of that and has lobbied heavily for that. I was the mayor of a city at a time when it seemed we had nothing but orange barrels, so I thought it was very important we had proper infrastructure. But with all of the consensus that has developed in the Senate around trying to solve our big issues, here is what we are doing. And many people on the other side of the aisle--my friends--can remember the debate during health care. One of the things that many people on my side of the aisle argued was a problem with the health care bill was that we were going to use 6 years worth of cost and 10 years worth of revenue. That was one of the things that actually got a lot of people's attention and concerned people on both sides of the aisle. What we are doing with this bill is even more egregious. What we are doing with this highway bill is we have 2 years' worth of cost and 10 years of revenue. Again, I know all of us want to see a highway bill put in place. I think most of us want to see a long-term highway bill put in place. But let me explain what is happening. The Senator from Maryland and I, every year or so, have to deal with something called SGR. It is the sustainability growth rate for Medicare. We put a formula in place back in 1997, but we haven't owned up to that. So what we do every year and a half or so is we kick the can further down the road and we create what is called a financial cliff at the end of it. Every time we deal with that, it gets more and more expensive. I understand people here in the Senate don't want to support physicians across their States, so we keep kicking the can down the road and not finding a way for a long-term solution that all of us know needs to be in place. I personally understand how people are concerned with how we reform Medicare. It affects a lot of seniors in our States, and we want to make sure we do that in the right way. What I don't understand is why on this highway bill, which has a trust set up--and by the way, it doesn't have the same type of constituency. I shouldn't be talking politics, but it doesn't. We deal with all of our Governors back home. But why on this highway bill are we creating exactly the same problem for our highway program that we have with SGR? What we are effectively doing, if we pass this bill in the way the Finance Committee has come up with paying for it, is we have created exactly the problem we have with SGR. I cannot imagine why anyone in this body wants to see us take one problem and transfer it to something else that so many of our Governors and people across our country depend upon. So here we are, in a situation where we all know our fiscal situation is not sustainable, we know we have to make changes--and I realize it is very unlikely those changes are going to happen this year--and yet we would go ahead and do what I think is unbelievably irresponsible, which is that we would go ahead and pass this highway bill where we are going to spend all the money in 2 years and pay for it over 10. So I am here to appeal to people on both sides of the aisle. This is a bipartisan issue. It is a bipartisan bill. This isn't one of those things where one side of the aisle is trying to pass something over the objections of the other side of the aisle. But I want to appeal to the conscience of the people in this body, to the moral high ground that sometimes this body can exhibit in representing the American people, that we not do the same kind of thing we have done with SGR--the doc fix and Medicare--to the highway bill. We ought to spend the amount of money we have coming in. If we don't think that is enough money to pay for it annually, we ought to change the way the revenue structure is coming into the program. There is no way in the world households in Maryland or Tennessee or any other place would possibly consider doing this. We know fiscally this doesn't work. Financially, it doesn't work. So I am hopeful enough people in this body will put aside expediency, put aside making everybody feel good back home in the short term, and not create a crisis. By the way, at the end of 2013, if we pass this bill as it is laid out now by the Finance Committee--even with the tweak they are looking at on IRAs--what we are looking at doing is putting in place a $10 billion cliff. Again, I think it is unbelievably irresponsible that we would transfer the same woes we have in our entitlement programs to the highway program. We ought to either spend the amount of money that is coming in annually and reduce the amount of outflows or we ought to do something different with the gas tax or some other revenue stream. But we should not put our heads in the sand and say, even though we know this doesn't work, it is an election year and we want to get a highway bill behind us. We know it is going to be bad news for our country down the road, but it is good news for us today. To me, that is irresponsible. So I am appealing to both sides of the aisle. I am appealing to all those people who have been to numerous meetings trying to figure out a bipartisan way--not as Republicans or Democrats, but in a bipartisan way--we can deal with our country's financial problems in an appropriate way, a pragmatic way, that doesn't jerk the rug out but gets us where we need to go over the next 10 years. I am appealing to all those people who act very sincerely in these meetings and speak with passion about where our country is going. I am appealing to their goodwill. I am appealing to their conscience. I am suggesting that we take the moral high ground and not let a bill pass like this--a bill that uses the same budget gimmickry we have used for so many years and that has put us in the place we are now in. I hope, in a bipartisan way, we will say, no, stop. Let's do this in the appropriate way that reflects the trust the American people have placed in us to handle their finances, their tax money, and this country. Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I came down today to talk about the highway bill we are on, and I want to say I appreciate the way we are dealing with each committee's portion of the bill as we go along. I know we are on the base bill at present, but before I get into that, I do want to make some comments about the budget. I know we have had an inability in the Senate to pass a budget over the last 1,100 days. I know the Acting President pro tempore--a friend of mine--led a city and had to do this each year. We had to do the same in our State and city. I think those of us who come to this body are always shocked at the lack of fiscal discipline that takes place in Washington in general, but I have to say in looking at the administration's budget that was put forth today, it makes a mockery of the American people. Our State has been blessed. We have had Governors who have been Republicans and Democrats, we have had people on both sides of the aisle, and our State has been governed well for a long time. I believe if a Governor of our State put forth a budget such as the budget put forth today, they would be run out of our State because it is not a serious budget. I know the Acting President pro tempore and I have been to many meetings and looked at some of the proposals that have been put out by groups like Bowles-Simpson, and it is stunning to me when we know the biggest issue our country faces is ourselves--meaning our own inability to deal with the fiscal issues that are before us and to deal with all of the reforms we know have to take place. When we know we are our own greatest enemy, to have a document that has been put out the way this one has been put out in almost a flippant way, is almost to say we don't have to deal with this serious issue that our country has to face which is pretty unbelievable. There is no focus on the kind of tax reform that I think so many of us support that would broaden the base and lower marginal rates and have tremendous economic growth. There is no focus on dealing with programs such as Medicare and Social Security that people depend upon, that people have counted upon all of their lives and yet we know they are not going to exist in a very short amount of time unless we do something. Instead, this document totally puts its head in the sand on these issues. It doesn't deal with them. To the Acting President pro tempore I will say that I think it is irresponsible for a President, facing the kinds of issues our country is facing and who is seeking another term, not to lay out what he believes is the approach for us to deal with these issues, just as I believe, by the way, that whoever the Republican nominee is, I think it is incumbent upon him to do exactly the same. I think all of us need to know what our Chief Executive Officer's plans are for this country as they relate to, again, the most important issue we have to deal with. The most appalling about it is we have millions of people looking for jobs right now. Unemployment is exceptionally high. I think almost every Member of this body who talks to people out there who actually are part of small business job creation knows they will tell us they are concerned about the future of our country. That is the biggest overhang that is keeping them from investing. So these issues are tied together in a most unique way. The greatest threat to our future is our inability to deal with fiscal issues. Our Chief Executive Officer, the President, has laid out a laughable document, one that, again, makes a mockery of the American people; yet at the same time it is us acting on real fiscal discipline that actually would drive our economy to grow and create jobs. Transportation Act I am very disappointed, which brings me to the point at hand. We have a highway bill. It is the first time I think we have dealt with a highway bill since I have been in the Senate for 5 years. We keep kicking the can down the road. It is my understanding that the EPW Committee passed this out 100 percent--Rs and Ds passed this out. Apparently they did some very good work, working together, to pass a base bill. It is also my understanding, though, that the Finance Committee is charged with paying for this and has come up with pay-fors that work like this: We are going to spend this money over a 2-year period but we are going to pay for it over a 10-year period. Again, I look at the Acting President pro tempore, somebody I know was responsible in the job he had prior to being here, and I am sure he is in this job too. But here is what we are doing: We are going to have Republicans down here constantly railing against the President's budget. My friends on the other side of the aisle won't do that out of respect, but I am sure they are wondering what in the world has been handed to us. At the same time, we have a piece of legislation on the floor that we are going to be dealing with that candidly does a lot of the same thing. We are going to spend money over the next 2 years and yet we are going to pay for it over the next 10. I think that is absolutely irresponsible. I hope before this highway bill leaves the floor we will either reduce the amount we are spending on it--which I hate to see happen because I know we do need to spend money on infrastructure around our country--or we will figure out a way to pay for it where if we are going to spend money over a 2-year period, we will also generate revenues to pay for it over a 2-year period. This bill does not do that. I do want to remind my Republican friends--I know we had some Republican support on the Finance Committee--that one of the things we railed about most with the health care bill that has divided our country in so many ways was that we took 6 years worth of cost and 10 years worth of revenues. All of us said it was a sleight of hand, and it was a sleight of hand; there is no question. I mean it was not honest in the way it was presented. But even since that time, with this most controversial bill, what we have done is actually moved away and now we are talking about in this highway bill spending money over a 2- year period but using pay-fors over a 10-year period. What that means is the next time we pass a highway bill under this same mode, we are continuing to run up tremendous debts. These young people who are sitting before us as pages, who come here to learn about how our country operates, want to see, hopefully, Senators acting in a responsible way. The fact is there will be a lot of focus today on the President's budget, and I know there is a lot of disappointment on both sides of the aisle regarding what that budget says. But the thing we can do in this body over the next week or so as we are looking at this highway bill is to ensure we don't fall into that same trap here in Congress in passing a highway bill that is not paid for, that uses future revenues which we will probably never see because we will flip them out and change them and use them in another way right after this bill is passed. I thank my colleagues for listening. I yield the floor, and I note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CORKER

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

Mr. CORKER

Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, what was the parliamentary procedure the leader just referred to?

Mr. CORKER. I object.