Christopher Dodd

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. I thank the Senator.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Madam President, before he leaves the floor, let me commend my colleague from Nebraska. He and I have worked on a number of issues over the years. In fact, in my remarks--and I had no knowledge when I prepared these remarks that I would be following my colleague from Nebraska--I quote some of the statements he has made about the situation in Iraq. I commend him for his candor and his directness. He brings a lot of experience and knowledge to these issues, and is as deeply committed as anyone here to the well-being of our men and women in uniform, regardless of where they serve. He has clearly pointed out what is necessary here, not only the resolution of our military presence in Iraq but, just as importantly, what comes afterward: How do we then move beyond the military question to the political, diplomatic, and economic issues that offer some hope to the Iraqi people and ourselves for reemerging in peace and stability in that part of the world. I commend him for his comments. I rise today to urge my colleagues to support the Feingold-Reid-Dodd amendment, which will come up at some point on this water bill under arrangements that the leader has provided, along with others. I would have preferred a freestanding proposal by my colleague from Wisconsin, whom I am pleased to join today, but under the circumstances, I recognize this may be the best opportunity we will have to actually debate his amendment, and I urge my colleagues to be supportive of his proposal. I realize it is a proposal that has some critics, but I believe it is the most honest, straightforward answer to the present situation in Iraq, one that is deteriorating by the hour, I would point out. We need to reverse 4 years of a failed policy by safely redeploying our troops out of harm's way, out of the middle of Iraq's civil war. Despite our best wishes, and our military's best efforts, we are unable to solve Iraq's problems and their civil war. That has become clear. We cannot do that with military force. That was the conclusion of our military leaders 4 years ago, and they have never wavered in that conclusion. There is not a military solution to Iraq's civil war. After invading over 4 years ago, we still lack a coherent strategy, and our military presence has not improved the security situation in Iraq. The valor, the determination, the courage of our service men and women has been remarkable, and all of us in this Chamber, I believe, share that view. Yet the situation in Iraq grows worse, literally by the hour. This is simply unacceptable. The President of our country contends now, as he contended for the last 4 years, and I quote him: Absolutely we're winning. Things are getting better. We do have a strategy, but it just needs more time. Those statements are false, unfortunately. We have no strategy in Iraq, in my view, just a surge tactic in search of a strategy. We had a surge in late 2005, and the result was the worst year of violence in Iraq since the war began. We also had two additional surges in Operation Together Forward I and II, and both of those surges failed as well. My colleague, Senator Hagel from Nebraska, recently argued, and I quote him here: The President's strategy is taking America deeper and deeper into quagmire, with no exit strategy. The strategy to deepen America's military involvement in Iraq will not bring about a resolution in Iraq. I wholeheartedly agree with that conclusion. As the Baker-Hamilton report rightly concluded, there will be no military victory in Iraq. Iraq's civil war cannot be solved with military force alone. Only Iraqis can solve the quagmire now facing their country. Only Iraqis can chose to reconcile, to reach power-sharing agreements, to govern and police collectively, and to share the country's oil wealth. But despite our best hopes that is not happening, and our military is unable to make that happen. This is why the surge tactic is fundamentally flawed. We cannot implement a military solution to what is fundamentally a political conflict in that country. I believe we have a moral obligation to protect Iraqis and to help them reach these compromises, but we are not succeeding in doing that. In fact, for 4 years now we have not succeeded in doing that as well. An objective look at key indicators since our invasion will demonstrate that the situation has steadily deteriorated each year under the Bush administration. Whether you examine the number of civilian deaths, the number of internally displaced refugees, the number of Iraqis who fled their country, now in excess of 2 million, or in the amount of power and water flowing into Iraqi homes, all of these indicators demonstrate the overall situation in Iraq has not improved. In fact, it has deteriorated during the last 4 years. That is why I believe we must begin redeploying our forces out of Iraq within the next 120 days and complete the redeployment within the next year. That is why I also believe that simultaneous to redeployment, and after the redeployment has been completed, we must conduct targeted counterterrorism activities to protect the Iraqi population from terrorists, to expunge al-Qaida from Iraq, and help ensure Iraq does not become a terrorist safe haven. I note that while I agree with Senator Levin that military readiness is currently lacking, I am concerned by the waiver provisions included in the amendment of my colleague from Michigan. It is true that due to the administration's defense policies many U.S. combat forces are not mission ready, are not adequately trained, and have not been given appropriate resting periods between deployments. I recently visited some soldiers at Walter Reed Hospital who had been injured in Iraq. I asked them how much cooperation they were getting from the Iraqi people and what their observations were. Without quoting them directly, let me paraphrase their comments. They said while the Iraqi people seem to be pleasant people and many seem to be interested in doing what they could to be helpful, in too many instances they pointed out that the civilian population knew where these IEDs were, these roadside devices. They knew where the ``ammo dumps,'' or the ammunition stockpiles were. Yet they never ever shared this information with our military in the communities where we were trying to provide security. One soldier pointed out that we would spend a month and a half cleaning out an area with problems, and an hour and a half after they had left, things were right back where they were a month and a half before. Those are their words, not mine. We know hear that these missions, despite the Herculean efforts of our military, are not getting this job done because of the raging civil war in that country. But providing a waiver to the President under the Levin amendment is tantamount, in my view, to re-authorizing the war. It doesn't hold the administration or the Iraqi Government accountable. It doesn't force a change in mission, and it doesn't begin to redeploy our forces. Instead it allows the administration to stay the course, full speed ahead, to use the words of Vice President Richard Cheney. The Feingold-Reid-Dodd amendment provides the best means, in my view, for changing our mission in Iraq. As much as I wish we were able to secure Iraq ourselves, that the surge would work, or that our military presence in Iraq would bring about the compromises necessary, I think the evidence is clear it is not happening, and it will not happen. The American people know this, our troops who have served and sacrificed in Iraq know it, and I believe the Iraqi people know it as well. Only when Iraqis themselves decide they will no longer tolerate violence and destruction, only when their leaders come together will this violence be reduced. That is what needs to happen across that plagued country. The United States should help where it can, by training and equipping reliable and accountable Iraqi security forces that will serve the greater Iraqi nation, not their own tribe or their own sect. According to a recent CBS poll, 70 percent of Shiites and nearly all of the Sunnis think the presence of U.S. forces in Iraq is making security worse. The vast majority of Iraqis, regardless of their sect, believe American troop presence in Iraq is making Iraq less safe. Madam President, 78 percent of Iraqis oppose the presence of U.S. forces on their soil, and 51 percent of Iraqis support attacks on coalition forces. Slightly more than half of the population we are trying to protect approve of the attacks on U.S. soldiers. That is just not acceptable. But it is not just the Iraqi public who want American forces out of their nation. The Iraqi Government does as well. A majority of the Iraqi Parliament recently signed a petition for a timetable governing a withdrawal of American forces, and in a recent high-level meeting, Iraq and its neighbors signed what they called the Marmara Declaration, reaffirming this sentiment. They declared in this declaration that ``a timetable should be established for the Government of Iraq to take full authority and responsibility, including for security throughout the country.'' The declaration went on to say: The United States should commit to a comprehensive strategy for responsible withdrawal, consistent with Iraq's security and stability based on milestones and a general time horizon. It also says: Iraq's Armed Forces need to be nationally representative, Iraq's police should be credible to its citizens, and representative to the communities they serve. The Feingold-Reid-Dodd amendment does just that. It does what the Iraqi people and the American people want, and it does it in a responsible way. This legislation mandates that the redeployment of U.S. forces should begin, as I mentioned, within a 120-day period and be completed within a year. Simultaneous to this redeployment, the legislation calls for continued counterterrorism operations, and the training and equipping of reliable and accountable Iraqi security forces to take over the responsibility of safeguarding the Iraqi population. It is up to us to change the President's failed course in Iraq and to hold our President and the Iraqi Government accountable. It is up to us to mandate a change in direction, to begin to responsibly bring our troops home, to continue to help the Iraqis battle terrorists, and to train and equip reliable Iraqi security forces ,so Iraqis can police their own country and decide their own future. We cannot afford another day of escalation, $2 billion a week, $8 billion a month, lives lost, lives completely ruined in many cases. But also what is happening in Iraq itself, with the dislocation of the Iraqi people, the 60,000 who have lost their lives--the situation is not improving. A true change in direction is needed. The price our Nation is paying, the price our men and women in uniform are paying, is too high for a failed policy, a policy that has not succeeded because it cannot succeed. I urge my colleagues at an appropriate time when Senator Feingold will offer his amendment to support this amendment. None of us can guarantee it is going to produce the desired result of convincing the Iraqi people what they should have been doing all along, instead of proposing a 2-month vacation, but rather sitting down and trying to come up with the political reconciliation for their country. Our hope is by beginning a clear redeployment and setting a termination date--this must or this may convince the Iraqi people and their leaders that they should come to terms with their own political future. For those reasons I urge the adoption of the Feingold amendment. I urge, as well, consideration of what Senator Hagel has suggested: talking about moving beyond the military issue, to utilize the tools available to us, the political, economic, diplomatic tools that are the means by which we should try to achieve reconciliation. But a continuation of our military presence under its present structure is not working. It should come to an end. This is the best effort to achieve that goal. Again, I urge the adoption of the Feingold amendment. I yield the floor.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Madam President, I rise to support passage of the committee substitute to S. 1082, the Food and Drug Administration Revitalization Act, FDARA. This legislation contains tremendous advances for children and their families through the reauthorization of the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act, BPCA, and the Pediatric Medical Device Safety and Improvement Act, which I authored, as well as the reauthorization of the Pediatric Research Equity Act, PREA, which was introduced by my colleague, Senator Clinton. I congratulate Chairman Kennedy and Ranking Member Enzi for their efforts in putting this complex bill together and thank them both for working with me to ensure these vital programs for children can thrive well into the future. We have had good debate on this legislation. I want to thank my friend from Colorado, Senator Allard, for the floor debate we had on BPCA. I want to assure him and those that voted for his amendment that this bill is about increasing pediatric clinical trials and improving our knowledge about products being used in children where previously we have had no information. BPCA is and has always been about striking an appropriate balance between the cost to consumers and benefits to children. Ten years ago when Senator Mike DeWine and I undertook this effort, only 11 drugs on the market that were being used in children had actually been tested and studied for their use. Prior to the enactment of BPCA 10 years ago, pediatricians were essentially flying blind because they lacked information regarding the safety and effectiveness of drugs they were prescribing for children. But it was children who suffered the most from taking drugs where so little was known about their effects. What we have learned over the past 10 years of experience is that children have been exposed to ineffective drugs, ineffective dosing, overdosing, or side effects from drugs that were previously unknown. In 10 years, nearly 800 studies involving more than 45,000 children in clinical trials have been completed. Useful new pediatric information is now part of product labeling for more than 119 drugs. In sum, there has been a twentyfold increase in the number of drugs studied in infants, children, and adolescents as a result of BPCA since its enactment. Children with a wide range of diseases such as HIV/AIDS, cancer, allergies, asthma, neurological and psychiatric disorders, and obesity can now lead healthier, more productive lives as a result of new information about the safety and efficacy of drugs they use to treat and manage their diseases where previously there was none. This successful program for children will expire on September 30 unless we act to reauthorize it. The reauthorization of BPCA contained within S. 1082, makes several important improvements to this program which I have spent many months developing. It is my belief that these improvements will help ensure that this program continues to thrive well into the future. I strongly support the 5-year authorization of this program so that we can closely monitor how the program is working and make improvements as they are needed in the future. S. 1082 will increase the amount and quality of pediatric information by streamlining BPCA and PREA at the Food and Drug Administration, FDA, and ensuring that labeling changes as a result of BPCA are communicated to physicians. S. 1082 will improve transparency and accountability by making market exclusivity determinations and written requests for pediatric studies public within 30 days of exclusivity being awarded. It also will improve the accuracy and speed of labeling changes by requiring such changes to be made within the FDA's timeline and ensuring that labeling reflects the results of the BPCA study that was conducted. S. 1082 will ensure that BPCA continues to yield more and better drug studies in children, while addressing the minority of cases where the incentive of 6 months additional market exclusivity has far exceeded the ``carrot'' it was intended to provide to drug sponsors. It improves market certainty by not allowing pediatric exclusivity to be granted within nine months of the end of the drug's patent and increases data about the use and applicability of BPCA through reports conducted by the Institute of Medicine, IOM, and the Government Accountability Office to review the program and assess the impact of the changes made within the legislation. BPCA has shown us that it is unsafe to simply treat children as smaller versions of adults. Children face a similar inequity with respect to medical devices. Far too few medical devices are specifically designed for children's small and growing bodies. Experts say that the development of children's medical devices lags 5 to 10 years behind that of adults. That is largely due to the limited size of the market for pediatric devices. When a medical device suitable for a child is needed to save that child's life but it does not exist, doctors are often forced to ``jury- rig'' adult versions of the device or, in some cases, perform a riskier surgery on the child. Ventilator masks, for instance, are far too large to fit over a baby's mouth. Often, the only alternative is to run an invasive tube down the baby's throat. Because of what we witnessed over the past ten years with the market incentives provided under BPCA, I introduced an initiative called the Pediatric Medical Device Safety and Improvement Act to create similar incentives for device manufacturers. This legislation also streamlines the approval process for cutting-edge technology and establishes grants for matchmaking between inventors and manufacturers and the Federal Government. Balancing incentives with safety, the legislation closely mirrors recommendations made by the IOM in its 2005 report on pediatric medical device safety to improve the serious flaws in the current postmarket safety surveillance of these devices. Specifically, the IOM called for and the legislation allows the FDA to require postmarket studies as a condition of clearance or approval for certain categories of devices and it gives the FDA the ability to require studies longer than 3 years with respect to a device that is to have significant use in pediatric populations if such studies would be necessary to address longer term pediatric questions, such as the impact on growth and development. Some in the medical device industry continue to offer proposals to chip away at the authorities in the legislation intended to ensure the FDA can request manufacturers to conduct postmarket safety surveillances and ensure devices used in children are safe. I am disheartened by anyone who would attempt to deprive children and physicians of information that pertains to device safety and I will strongly oppose attempts to weaken the postmarket safety standards contained within the legislation as the bill heads to conference. The faster we can get new, safe pediatric devices to market, the fewer parents have to stake their children's lives on improvisation and guesswork. I have previously mentioned the broad-ranging support for these important initiatives for children but it is worth restating that the level of support from pediatricians, patient advocacy organizations, drug and device companies, and many others indicates that this important legislation will greatly benefit children and their families. I want to thank the tremendous work of the staff on this bill. They have devoted countless hours and many weekends to working on this legislation. Specifically, I want to thank David Bowen and David Dorsey with Senator Kennedy and Shana Christrup, Keith Flanagan and Amy Muhlberg with Senator Enzi who worked so closely with my office on the pediatrics initiatives in title IV of this legislation. I also want to thank Kate Leone with Senator Harry Reid whose terrific leadership helped guide this legislation to passage. I also want to acknowledge the leadership of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation whose staff, Mark Del Monte, Jeanne Ireland and Elaine Vining, have provided tremendous technical assistance on the pediatrics initiatives in S. 1082. Before I close I want to address the other provision in this legislation which reauthorizes vital user fee programs at the FDA for drugs and devices and addresses the important issue of drug safety at the FDA, an agency that regulates 25 percent of the products consumed by Americans. In recent years, we have witnessed a public crisis of confidence in the FDA's ability to ensure that the drugs taken by millions of Americans are safe and effective once they are on the market. My colleagues and I on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, HELP, Committee heard testimony about the internal crisis within the scientific community at the FDA about inappropriate influences on decisionmaking. I was deeply troubled by the recent Union of Concerned Scientists study showing that of nearly 1,000 FDA scientists questioned, 420 reported that they knew of cases in which the Department of Health and Human Services or FDA political appointees have inappropriately injected themselves into FDA determinations or actions. The same study also found that 378 FDA scientists disagreed or strongly disagreed that the FDA is acting effectively to protect public health. With Vioxx, antidepressants in children, and now Ketek, the FDA has repeatedly been accused of suppressing internal safety concerns and ignoring repeated warnings of safety concerns from the FDA's own scientists. We need to restore the public trust in this vital agency, rid it of undue influences that benefit a political, rather than a public health, agenda, and, above all, we need to adequately fund the FDA through the appropriations process so that the agency is less reliant on user fees collected from private industry. Congress must act swiftly to give the FDA more resources. That, I believe, is how we maintain the FDA as the world's gold standard in drug and device safety. Senator Grassley and I authored one of the first drug safety and clinical trials bills in the Senate in the wake of the Vioxx scandal that would have given FDA's office of postmarket drug surveillance the independence, stature and funding to take action when a safety problem arises. We reintroduced the bill this congress with several colleagues on the HELP Committee including Senators Mikulski and Bingaman and I thank them for their support. While I do not agree with some of my colleagues who have argued that this authority would create a bigger bureaucracy at the FDA, our experience showed us that the support to move such a proposal simply wasn't there. However, I believe that my colleagues and I were able to make significant improvements to S. 1082 with respect to drug safety. I believe those improvements will strengthen science at the FDA, improve transparency of decisionmaking so that dissenting views can be heard, and improve safety of drugs once they are on the market. The drug safety and clinical trials components of S. 1082 are by no means perfect. In fact, I have serious concerns about what I view as inadequate enforcement authority in the bill and am particularly concerned about whether the bill will prevent companies from withholding information about clinical trials which were negative or were trials that companies abandoned because initial results were negative. As demonstrated by Ketek, I am also concerned about whether this bill does enough to capture clinical trials conducted overseas. I hope we can improve on these provisions when this bill goes to conference with the House. Today the Senate voted on an important issue dealing with conflicts of interest on FDA advisory committees. As demonstrated by the FDA advisory committee considering Vioxx, it is clear that the FDA's policy with respect to financial conflicts of interest wasn't working. The FDA has made modifications to its policy and the underlying legislation makes several additional improvements. I believe the amendment offered by Senators Durbin and Bingaman would have made great improvements to the recruitment of qualified advisory committee members. The amendment would have required the FDA to conduct aggressive outreach to professional medical and scientific societies to help with recruitment for advisory committees, especially ones with the greatest number of vacancies. Those are important policy goals and ones that I fully support. However, I voted against the amendment because I was concerned about the impact a hard and fast limit of one waiver per committee meeting would have on timely access to drugs and new drug information. Specifically, the Pediatric Advisory Committee, a standing FDA advisory committee which relies on experts with specific expertise in pediatric issues, is an important component of the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act program. I was concerned that setting an arbitrary limit on the number of waivers per committee meeting would further complicate an already small pool of qualified individuals in fields such as pediatrics. I am disappointed that an agreement on the amendment was not reached between the bill managers and sponsors of the amendment so that the Senate bill could contain the important provisions dealing with recruitment and outreach. It is my hope that we can find a way to address these issues in the conference with the House. Taken as a whole, the underlying legislation is vital to our nation's children as well as consumers needing timely access to safe and effective drugs. Therefore, it is essential that the House act quickly so that we can send a conference report to the President in the coming months. I urge the House to pass all of the major provisions contained in S. 1082. I support this legislation and look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle and in both Chambers so that we can send this legislation to the President for his signature.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce a bill that will restore the rights of veterans and their families to receive an official grave marker from the Department of Veterans' Affairs in acknowledgement of their service to this Nation. I am pleased to be joined by Senators Kerry, Voinovich, Conrad, Byrd, and Brown as original cosponsors. This legislation addresses a serious, and easily remedied, inequity that exists for veterans who passed away during the period between November 1, 1990, and September 11, 2001. There is an inscription in Colleville-sur-Mer, France, at Omaha Beach, commemorating those Americans who perished in the World War II battle there, that reads: This embattled shore, this portal of freedom, is forever hallowed by the ideas, the valor and sacrifice of our fellow countrymen. Their graves are the permanent and visible symbols of their heroic devotion and their sacrifice in the common cause of humanity. These endured all and gave all that justice among nations might prevail and that mankind might enjoy freedom and inherit peace. Monuments like this, or like the many spectacular memorials right here in Washington, DC, serve as a reminder of the service, dedication, and sacrifice of our Nation's veterans. They are a tribute not to the suffering and darkness of war, but to the tremendous courage of those who served so that, as the inscription says, ``mankind might enjoy freedom and inherit peace.'' And in a small way, the markers placed at veterans' gravesites serve as a similar reminder for the friends and family members who visit a loved one's grave. Until 1990, the family of a deceased American veteran could receive reimbursement for a VA headstone, a VA marker, or a private headstone. However, I regret to say, in the name of cutting costs, measures were taken to prevent the VA from providing markers to those families that had purchased gravestones out of their own pockets. In my view, this constitutes a serious injustice; one that we must correct. It is shocking to me that veterans who passed during those 11 years are denied an official grave marker, and yet that is the effect of current law. We owe it to these brave men and women to honor their service to this country. We have seen too many instances in which our veterans have not been accorded the respect they deserve. The accounts that have surfaced about the deplorable conditions at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the consistent underfunding of the Veterans Health Administration shine an unpleasant spotlight on the ways in which we have fallen far short of our obligations to our Nation's veterans. And now, how can we deny veterans the simple honor of recognizing their service with a graveside marker? This body first endorsed a provision restoring the right of every veteran to receive a grave marker as early as June 7, 2000, as part of the fiscal year 2001 Defense Authorization bill. This body approved this language again on December 8, 2001. But it was not until December 6, 2002, that legislation was signed into law as part of the Veterans Improvement Act, allowing VA markers to be provided to deceased veterans retroactively. Unfortunately, however, when the bill went to a conference with the House of Representatives, this benefit was inexplicably applied retroactively only to September 11, 2001, rather than to November 1, 1990, the date at which the new VA regulation came into effect. In my view, to arbitrarily deny veterans who passed away during that 11-year period is unconscionable. Their service to our Nation was no less dedicated than the service of those who passed away before and after that period. It is an insult to their memories and to the families and friends who loved them. This legislation is quite simple. It merely allows all veterans who have passed away since 1990 to be provided with official VA grave markers and it repeals the expiration of the VA's authority to provide these grave markers. The VA is supportive of this legislation, which I believe will ensure that all of our Nation's veterans are accorded the respect they are due for their sacrifices. In a report submitted to Congress on February 10, 2006, the VA endorsed both provisions of this legislation, recommending that the grave marker authority be made permanent and retroactive to 1990. Moreover, this bill is inexpensive. The Congressional Budget Office estimated the cost of this bill to be just $1 million over 5 years and $2 million over 10 years. Who can argue that this is too high a price to pay to honor our fallen heroes? We are approaching the 9th anniversary of the passing of Mr. Agostino Guzzo, a Connecticut resident who bravely served in the U.S. Armed Forces in the Philippines during World War II. His family interred his body in a mausoleum at the Cedar Hill Cemetery in Hartford, CT. The family was not aware of the VA's restrictions on grave markers at the time, and was told by the VA that there was no way to receive official recognition. Agostino's son, Mr. Thomas Guzzo, brought the matter to my attention, and we were able to pass legislation granting Agostino the memorial he deserves. But too many families are still denied such markers. This legislation honors the memory of Agostino Guzzo and all of the veterans who have served their country in war and in peace. Thomas Guzzo's commitment to this issue has not ended. The commitment of this Congress should continue, as well. I hope my colleagues will support this important legislation. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce a bill that will restore the rights of veterans and their families to receive an official grave marker from the Department of Veterans' Affairs in acknowledgement of their service to this Nation. I am pleased to be joined by Senators Kerry, Voinovich, Conrad, Byrd, and Brown as original cosponsors. This legislation addresses a serious, and easily remedied, inequity that exists for veterans who passed away during the period between November 1, 1990, and September 11, 2001. There is an inscription in Colleville-sur-Mer, France, at Omaha Beach, commemorating those Americans who perished in the World War II battle there, that reads: This embattled shore, this portal of freedom, is forever hallowed by the ideas, the valor and sacrifice of our fellow countrymen. Their graves are the permanent and visible symbols of their heroic devotion and their sacrifice in the common cause of humanity. These endured all and gave all that justice among nations might prevail and that mankind might enjoy freedom and inherit peace. Monuments like this, or like the many spectacular memorials right here in Washington, DC, serve as a reminder of the service, dedication, and sacrifice of our Nation's veterans. They are a tribute not to the suffering and darkness of war, but to the tremendous courage of those who served so that, as the inscription says, ``mankind might enjoy freedom and inherit peace.'' And in a small way, the markers placed at veterans' gravesites serve as a similar reminder for the friends and family members who visit a loved one's grave. Until 1990, the family of a deceased American veteran could receive reimbursement for a VA headstone, a VA marker, or a private headstone. However, I regret to say, in the name of cutting costs, measures were taken to prevent the VA from providing markers to those families that had purchased gravestones out of their own pockets. In my view, this constitutes a serious injustice; one that we must correct. It is shocking to me that veterans who passed during those 11 years are denied an official grave marker, and yet that is the effect of current law. We owe it to these brave men and women to honor their service to this country. We have seen too many instances in which our veterans have not been accorded the respect they deserve. The accounts that have surfaced about the deplorable conditions at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the consistent underfunding of the Veterans Health Administration shine an unpleasant spotlight on the ways in which we have fallen far short of our obligations to our Nation's veterans. And now, how can we deny veterans the simple honor of recognizing their service with a graveside marker? This body first endorsed a provision restoring the right of every veteran to receive a grave marker as early as June 7, 2000, as part of the fiscal year 2001 Defense Authorization bill. This body approved this language again on December 8, 2001. But it was not until December 6, 2002, that legislation was signed into law as part of the Veterans Improvement Act, allowing VA markers to be provided to deceased veterans retroactively. Unfortunately, however, when the bill went to a conference with the House of Representatives, this benefit was inexplicably applied retroactively only to September 11, 2001, rather than to November 1, 1990, the date at which the new VA regulation came into effect. In my view, to arbitrarily deny veterans who passed away during that 11-year period is unconscionable. Their service to our Nation was no less dedicated than the service of those who passed away before and after that period. It is an insult to their memories and to the families and friends who loved them. This legislation is quite simple. It merely allows all veterans who have passed away since 1990 to be provided with official VA grave markers and it repeals the expiration of the VA's authority to provide these grave markers. The VA is supportive of this legislation, which I believe will ensure that all of our Nation's veterans are accorded the respect they are due for their sacrifices. In a report submitted to Congress on February 10, 2006, the VA endorsed both provisions of this legislation, recommending that the grave marker authority be made permanent and retroactive to 1990. Moreover, this bill is inexpensive. The Congressional Budget Office estimated the cost of this bill to be just $1 million over 5 years and $2 million over 10 years. Who can argue that this is too high a price to pay to honor our fallen heroes? We are approaching the 9th anniversary of the passing of Mr. Agostino Guzzo, a Connecticut resident who bravely served in the U.S. Armed Forces in the Philippines during World War II. His family interred his body in a mausoleum at the Cedar Hill Cemetery in Hartford, CT. The family was not aware of the VA's restrictions on grave markers at the time, and was told by the VA that there was no way to receive official recognition. Agostino's son, Mr. Thomas Guzzo, brought the matter to my attention, and we were able to pass legislation granting Agostino the memorial he deserves. But too many families are still denied such markers. This legislation honors the memory of Agostino Guzzo and all of the veterans who have served their country in war and in peace. Thomas Guzzo's commitment to this issue has not ended. The commitment of this Congress should continue, as well. I hope my colleagues will support this important legislation. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, let me first begin by thanking Senator Kennedy and Senator Enzi for including the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act and the Pediatric Medical Device Safety and Improvement Act in the bill before us. I congratulate them, particularly Senator Kennedy for his efforts of putting all this together, this major legislation which is going to be so important for the health and well- being of all our citizenry. I am very grateful to him, and to Senator Enzi as well, for leading the minority on this issue and making it possible for us to be here today to discuss these issues. My friend from Colorado and I worked together on this issue. I appreciate the comments about the effort we made over the past decade or more to try to do what this bill was designed to do and has done, and that is to increase the clinical trials and testing of products used in our younger Americans--children. In too many cases, prescription drugs were being tested for adults, and there was an assumption that a smaller dosage of that product would be all that was necessary to take care of children. Obviously, that was not the case, as we heard in significant testimony over the years. Countless hours have gone into the work on this legislation. The Presiding Officer has been a tremendous help. I thank him for his efforts, along with others on this committee helping us put this together. It must be an Ohio tradition. As he has heard me say on occasion, Senator Brown has been tremendously supportive, working on this issue. He was active on the issue when he served in the other body, and he brought his talents and knowledge to the issue when he arrived here recently. His predecessor, Senator DeWine, was my cosponsor on this bill for a decade, on a bipartisan basis putting the legislation together that has produced the results which have been identified by Senator Allard and Senator Enzi already this morning. We find ourselves here having worked very carefully together on a bipartisan basis for more than a decade to craft legislation. None of us are claiming perfection here. The idea was to try to induce the industry to step forward and do something they had not done before--to test their products in children. We were not certain when we started out how this would actually work. Ten years ago, we saw a situation where the majority of drugs being used in children were not being tested for their use. Children are not simply little adults. The results of drug studies conducted under the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act have shown they should not be treated as such. The initiative contained in the bill before us on pediatric medical devices is a similar effort to ensure children are not left behind as cutting-edge research and revolutionary technologies for medical devices advance. Senator DeWine, as I mentioned, and I authored this bill more than a decade ago, at a time when only 11 drugs on the market that were being used for children had actually been tested and studied for that use. Prior to the enactment of this legislation a decade ago, pediatricians were essentially flying blind because they lacked information regarding the safety and effectiveness of drugs they were prescribing. It was often the children who suffered the most. What we have learned over this past decade after 10 years of experience is that children have been exposed to ineffective drugs, ineffective dosing, overdosing, or drug side effects that were previously unknown. In 10 years, nearly 800 studies involving more than 45,000 children in clinical trials have been completed as a result of this legislation. Useful new pediatric information is now part of product labeling for more than 119 drugs. In sum, there has been a 20-fold increase in drugs studied in infants, children, and adolescents as a result of the legislation I authored 10 years ago. Children with a wide range of diseases such as HIV/AIDS, cancer, allergies, asthma, neurological and psychological disorders, and obesity can now lead healthier and more productive lives as a result of new information about the safety and efficacy of drugs they use to treat and manage their diseases when previously there was none. This successful program for children will expire on the 30th of September unless we reauthorize it. I have spent months crafting a proposal to reauthorize this legislation, which is now reflected in the underlying bill. It had been my hope that this initiative would continue in that bipartisan tradition that began more than a decade ago. Fashioning legislation when there are 100 of us here, trying to come up with ideas, and yet balance disparate views and opinions. There are some, frankly, who would have no periods of exclusivity and believe the industry ought to be doing this as a matter of obligation to one out of four Americans. You have heard from others who think we ought to provide extended periods of exclusivity, longer than 6 months. It is not easy to fashion these compromises here, where you can put something together that does what we want to do, all the while ensuring that the program can continue to generate more benefits than were originally contemplated. There has to be some limitation in terms of how we deal with all this. I thank Senators Kennedy, Harkin, Bingaman, Murray, Reed, Clinton, and Brown, who all cosponsored the legislation I introduced which, as I previously mentioned, has been incorporated on this bill. Mr. President, I will ask unanimous consent that these letters be printed in the Record so my colleagues will know the bill we are considering is not something we threw together haphazardly. This was major, extensive work with major organizations in this country that spend every waking hour working on children's diseases and issues that affect their health. I am grateful to the AIDS Alliance for Children, Youth & Families; the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry; American Academy of Pediatrics; the American Brain Coalition; American Pediatric Society; the American Psychiatric Association; the American Thoracic Society; the Arthritis Foundation; the Association of Medical School Pediatric Department Chairs; Children's Cause for Cancer Advocacy; Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation; National Association of Children's Hospitals; National Organization for Rare Disorders; Society for Pediatric Research--the list goes on. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record two letters from this myriad of organizations which every day are involved with children's health and are strong advocates of what we are doing here and respectfully disagree with the amendment offered by Senator Allard today.

Mr. DODD. To anyone offering to flyspeck this proposal and offer variations to it, I would say that months and months have gone into this legislation which we think has had the dual effect of ensuring that the ramifications of expanding the length of exclusivity, as some have proposed, have been carefully considered along with proposals to limit the length of exclusivity to 3 months for all drugs, as others have proposed. The bill before us balances many viewpoints on this program and is a proposal that 15 major organizations involved with the effort strongly support. Throughout the 10-year history of the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act, Congress has recognized the need to ensure it strikes the appropriate balance between the cost to consumers and benefits to children. By instituting a 5-year sunset in both the original legislation in 1997 and the first reauthorization in 2002, Congress was acknowledging the ongoing need to evaluate the cost of the incentive under this act to consumers in relation to the benefit of having medications properly studied and labeled for children. The 6-month incentive of exclusivity has been very successful in generating pediatric studies. Yet after 10 years, experience and data have shown us that for a small number of drugs, pediatric exclusivity has far exceeded the carrot that was designed to encourage people to move forward. In February of this year, the Journal of the American Medical Association published a study of the profits drug manufacturers received from the additional 6 months of pediatric exclusivity. The study found that most of the drugs studied under the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act in recent years received relatively modest returns. In fact, data shows that many drugs came close to breaking even with respect to financial returns on investment for conducting pediatric trials. In one place they may have had a negative return. However, the study also found, and I quote them here, that ``the pediatric exclusivity program overcompensates blockbuster products from performing clinical trials in children.'' S. 1082 contains a very reasonable, workable mechanism to address cost concerns. By adjusting exclusivity from 6 months to 3 months only for those products with U.S. sales over $1 billion, I think S. 1082 can address consumer concerns about excessive profits without jeopardizing the extraordinary benefits of this legislation. I don't think it is too much to ask. That is why we have the sunset provisions in this program, to be able to go back and analyze how this is working every 5 years. So for those products in excess of a $1 billion, we shorten exclusivity. I am satisfied. Pfizer, a leading drug company in this country, supports this proposal. The producer of the largest blockbuster drug in the world says this is a good compromise. Why are my colleagues having a hard time? If a major drug company who has benefitted under this exclusivity and manufactured blockbuster drugs says this bill is a sound compromise, what is the problem my colleagues have with this proposal? If Pfizer, a company that has benefitted from this program says this balance is a healthy one, why can't my colleagues be happy with it? This bill is a good bill. It has done a good job for people. But let's remind ourselves that we also have a responsibility to consumers. And when consumers find themselves in a situation where they can't afford lifesaving medicines, then it is time for us to strike a balance. This bill has a sunset provision in it. I am for the sunset provision. I am for it because we need to come back again in 5 years and assess where we are on this issue rather than make a determination that in perpetuity this is a program and a balance that makes sense forever. According to the Congressional Budget Office, eliminating the exclusivity adjustment, as the amendment offered by my colleague from Colorado would do, would increase the cost of exclusivity to the Federal Government by $50 million over 10 years. So in addition to the consumers, taxpayers are going to be asked to pay an additional $50 million under the Allard amendment. Again, if we have drug companies saying they think this proposal is a good balance, why are we adding a $50 million pricetag to the taxpayers with the Allard amendment, not to mention the cost of these drugs increasing as a result of extending exclusivity from 3 months to 6 months for products with sales in excess of $1 billion? As I said, this is something I have worked on for a long time in a bipartisan fashion: to strike a balance as we've tried to do for 10 years between benefits to children and cost to consumers. To now say all of us who have worked on this program are wrong, all of the organizations involved with children's health are wrong, and drug companies that have benefitted from this program are wrong--but we know best. We know best. We think those billion-dollar products deserve to be protected. We think the taxpayers should foot the $50 million bill and the cost of these drugs are irrelevant in this debate. Well, they are not irrelevant. We may do great damage to something we are trying to achieve after a decade of hard work on a bipartisan basis to put this together. I say respectfully to my friend from Colorado and the Senator from Wyoming, we have worked hard to strike these balances. It is not easy. These are complicated issues. It requires cooperation on both sides of the aisle to get the job done. That is what I have done for a decade with Members of that side of the aisle to see to it that we have a good, strong bill. The result is a program which has gone far beyond what we anticipated might happen. The slight adjustment we have made after analyzing this bill after 10 years is little to ask. If one of the largest beneficiaries of the program is satisfied, and if the organizations who support this program believe it is all right, why are we adding a $50 million pricetag and asking consumers to pay more? I urge my colleagues to reject the Allard amendment when the vote occurs. I thank Senator Kennedy and others who have worked so hard to make this possible. This is a very important piece of legislation, and one that can do an awful lot of good. The amendment offered by my colleague from Colorado puts that at risk. Our children in this country deserve better than what he is offering, which is to try to break up the delicate balance I have tried to put together for a decade. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, if I may, I would like to divide my 10 minutes, and I would like to spend a few minutes on another part of the bill, the Pediatric Medical Device Safety and Improvement Act. I thank Senator Kennedy and Senator Enzi for including this bill which I authored in the underlying legislation. The pediatric medical devices provision of the underlying bill is not subject to an amendment, but I want my colleagues to know what we have done with this provision, which is a complementary piece of legislation dealing with a similar set of issues as under the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act. That is, ensuring that medical devices used in children are safe and designed specifically for children. One of the fundamental hurdles with respect to children is that the market for products designed for them is relatively small. However, I believe the proposals in the underlying bill will make a huge difference in the lives of children. This initiative provides a very comprehensive approach to ensuring that children are not left behind as cutting-edge research and revolutionary technologies for medical devices advance. Like drugs, where for too long children were treated like small adults and were just given reduced dosages, many essential medical devices used by pediatricians are not designed or sized for children, and that has been the case for many years. Pediatric providers have had to resort to jury-rigging or fashioning makeshift device solutions for pediatric use. When that is not an option, providers may be forced to use more invasive treatments or less effective therapies. This legislation addresses the need to promote pediatric device development by providing incentives to manufacturers while at the same time equipping the Food and Drug Administration with appropriate authority to monitor and ensure the postmarket safety of medical devices used significantly in children. One such example which highlights the need for this legislation is a device known as the Vertical Expandable Prosthetic Titanium Rib, a device invented, developed, and brought to market by Dr. Robert Campbell, Professor of Orthopaedics at the University of Texas Health Science Center. Dr. Campbell appeared before the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee in late March and testified about the arduous 14 years it took to bring the titanium rib to market. Dr. Robert Campbell made remarkable breakthroughs with this technology but the hurdles he faced were, at times, seemingly insurmountable. I want to put up a photograph of a boy named Devin Alvarez, of Hialeah Gardens, Florida, which shows the remarkable difference this device has made for him. Devin was born with six ribs missing and a very small left lung and kidney. At birth, the doctors did not believe he was going to survive his first night. In May 2002, Devin underwent titanium rib implant surgery and the curve of his spine was reduced to 45 degrees. Devin stood straight for the first time in his life and, at present, Devin is a very typical 9-year-old boy who enjoys playing sports such as golf and baseball. Again, remarkable ideas for pediatric medical devices happen regularly, but the incentives to transform ideas into new FDA-approved devices simply don't exist. So the motivation for the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act legislation 10 years ago dealing with pharmaceutical products for children is the same motivation behind this legislation--to encourage the medical device industry to develop and to engage in the kind of research to allow these technologies to emerge. In describing the pediatric medical devices bill which is now included in this legislation, Dr. Campbell, who has been so instrumental in all of this, said: This bill represents an historic step forward for children's medical and surgical devices similar to those steps taken on drugs. It will help future medical inventors of pediatric devices to avoid my mistakes and my frustrations so that they can get their devices ``off the napkin,'' if you will, and into the pediatric patients who need them, in a safe and timely fashion. I thank my colleagues from Massachusetts and Wyoming for working hard to make sure this will be a part of the underlying bill. I am grateful to them. It is my understanding that concerns have been raised by some in the medical device industry regarding a particular provision of the bill related to equipping the Food and Drug Administration with authority to ensure the safety of medical devices in children once they are already on the market. The provisions in the bill mirror the recommendations made by the Institute of Medicine in its 2005 report on pediatric medical device safety. The Institute of Medicine found serious flaws in the current postmarket safety surveillance of these devices and the provisions in my bill correct those serious flaws. I am disheartened by those who would attempt to deprive children and physicians with information that pertains to device safety. I think we have made some tremendous advances for children and their families in this legislation. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that relevant material relating to the medical device provision of this legislation be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, let me go back, if I can, to my proposal on the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act and the objections raised by my colleague from Colorado to it. Just for the record and so we understand what we are talking about, according to a study recently published in the Journal of the American Medical Association that looked at the costs and benefits of these pediatric trials. It showed that the overwhelming majority of drugs studied under this incentive program are not blockbusters. In fact, the study found that less than 20 percent were. That leaves 80 percent of drugs completely unaffected by the underlying bill which the Allard amendment seeks to amend. To be clear, the proposal in the underlying bill that would adjust exclusivity from 6 months to 3 months affects less than about 20 percent of drugs studied under this program. Using data from this recent study, 80 percent of drugs studied under BPCA--those which do not fall into the blockbuster category--the 6 months' exclusivity would remain unchanged. It doesn't change that at all; only in cases where there has been over $1 billion in prior year drug sales will the underlying bill change the exclusivity to 3 months. This is to strike a balance. Obviously, I feel very strongly, having authored this legislation, about ensuring that appropriate clinical trials occur to protect children's health. Our notion was, when we wrote the legislation 10 years ago, that the 6 months of exclusivity would be the carrot that would incentivize the industry to go forward. There were some concerns expressed at the time that 6 months wasn't going to be anywhere near enough and that we would need more exclusivity. Some in the industry suggested a year or even 3 years of exclusivity. We settled on 6 months as the appropriate balance at the time. What happened, of course, is we had this wonderful explosion of work that occurred. It resulted in nearly 800 clinical trials involving more than 45,000 children, with new pediatric labeling information on more than 119 drugs where previously there was none. I recall the debate on this program ten years ago very well, the industry said: Six months is never going to be enough; none of us will step up to the plate on this. And they really argued very strenuously for something longer than the 6 months. In fact, the 6 months has worked well, and almost all requests issued to drug companies to conduct pediatric trials under this program have been accepted. What I have had growing concern about is the 20 percent of drugs receiving exclusivity where the profit realized as far exceeded the carrot intended to provide to drug companies. So to strike that balance between the cost to taxpayers and the benefits to children, we are saying that where sales of a drug being studied under this program exceed $1 billion in prior years, the company can get 3 months' exclusivity. I don't know what the right answer will be on this issue. Neither me nor my colleague from Oklahoma can say with absolute certainty. But I recall the debate 10 years ago when many said 6 months will never be enough. Six months has done very well by the industry, as it turned out. So by striking this balance and having the sunset provision which I strongly support in this legislation--and I have from the beginning--it will allow us to review periodically how we are doing with all of this. There is an increase in Federal spending of $50 million over 10 years as a result of the Allard amendment. I can't invoke a point of order because the impact on federal spending is outside our current budget window, but the Allard amendment comes with a $50 million pricetag to taxpayers. I believe this program is working well. We think by adjusting the length of exclusivity from 6 months to 3 months for a limited number of drugs, we are striking the right balance. The 5-year sunset will give us a chance to assess the program again and make a judgment: How are we doing here? Are we getting more or less of what we thought we would in the process? At that time, we will make a judgment again as to how we ought to go forward. It is not easy to strike these balances. I know my colleagues who have engaged in these debates, try to come up with answers that will satisfy the various elements and concerns various Members have. That is what Mike DeWine and I did 10 years ago and why I had such a good partner in this where we struck that balance. Mike was under a lot of pressure to have a lot more than 6 months of exclusivity. I was under pressure in saying: Why do we give them any exclusivity? So we compromised on 6 months to see what happened. We got great results. I would love to predict with absolute certainty that what we craft here will produce those same results. I can't say that absolutely. But based on the analyses of others who have looked at this, their conclusion is this is a pretty healthy balance between consumer interests, taxpayer interests, and the needs of children. We will see what happens over the next 4 or 5 years as to whether this is continuing to produce the desired results. I believe it will. I think we will get that. Here again, based on recent data, under my proposal, 80 percent of drugs studied under this program will see no change in the exclusivity award of 6 months. Again, for the 20 percent of drugs in the blockbuster category, they can receive 3 months of exclusivity. I still believe many will go forward, given that incentive. So respectfully I say to my friend from Colorado--we serve on two committees together and we work well together on a lot of issues here. I respect him immensely. I do not question at all his motivations in offering this amendment. This disagreement is over the impact of his language versus the language I have crafted in this legislation as part of the committee print. So I urge my colleagues to reject the Allard amendment and to stick what with what we put together in the underlying bill. It is a good balance between taxpayer interests, consumer interests, and the interests of children and their families. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise to join my colleague Senator Lugar, along with Representatives Boucher and Pence in the House of Representatives, in introducing the Free Flow of Information Act. This bill would protect journalists from being forced to reveal their confidential sources, not as an end in itself, but as a means to a well-informed public. I applaud the tireless efforts of the senior Senator from Indiana, Mr. Lugar, in once again bringing this important issue to the attention of Congress and indeed the nation. I hardly have to read the litany of grave wrongs that have been exposed because journalists called the powerful to account. And I don't have to remind you how many of those exposures relied on confidential sources. Without confidential sources, would we still be ignorant about abuse of power in the Watergate era? Without confidential sources, would Enron still be profiting from fraud? How long would torture at Abu Ghraib have persisted, if proof hadn't been provided to the press? The free flow of information provides the American people its most meaningful check on abuses such as those. Thomas Jefferson said it best: ``If I had to make a choice, to choose the government without the press or to have the press but without the government, I will select the latter without hesitation.'' Jefferson clearly understood that a free Government cannot possibly last without a free press. But today, we find this cornerstone of self-government facing a new threat. This threat has not come from the dictates of a dangerous government, but from the best of intentions. In a spate of recent cases, prosecutors have used subpoenas, fines, and jail time to compel journalists to reveal their anonymous sources. Judith Miller of The New York Times was jailed for 85 days for refusing to reveal a source. Two San Francisco Chronicle reporters were found in contempt of court for refusing to identify sources and hand over material related to the BALCO steroids investigation. A Rhode Island journalist was sentenced to home arrest on similar charges. Last year alone, a total of some two dozen reporters have been subpoenaed or questioned about confidential sources. They were all journalists prosecuted only for the offense of journalism. The impact of these subpoenas on the broader issue of freedom of information is undeniable. Last summer, for instance, the editor-in- chief of Time magazine testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. This is what he said about the fallout from the Justice Department's efforts to obtain confidential information from a Time reporter: ``Valuable sources have insisted that they no longer trusted the magazine and that they would no longer cooperate on stories. The chilling effect is obvious.'' The chilling effect is obvious. Experience has shown us that the most effective constraint on free speech need not be blatant censorship: A few cases like Ms. Miller's and the San Francisco Chronicle's, and news will begin censoring itself. We can only speculate as to how many editors and publishers put the brakes on a story for fear that it could land one of their reporters in a spider web of subpoenas, charges of contempt, and prison. When we minimize the impact of confidential sources, serious journalism is crippled. We will find our papers full of stories more and more palatable to the powerful and secretive. No one argues that that is the intention of those prosecuting these cases; but few deny that it could, in time, be their effect. When journalists are hauled into court and threatened with imprisonment if they don't divulge their sources, we are entering dangerous territory for a democracy. The information we need to remain sovereign will be degraded; the public's right to know will be threatened; and I suggest to you that the liberties we hold dear will be threatened as well. That is exactly why we need a Federal reporter shield. Forty-nine States and the District of Columbia have already recognized that need by enacting similar protection on the state level either through legislation or court decisions; the Free Flow of Information Act simply extends that widely recognized protection to the Federal courts. The new version of this bill expands coverage in two significant ways. First, it will not only protect the information journalists obtain under the promise of confidentiality; it will also cover the ``work product'' of journalists as well, whether or not it was subject to that promise. And second, it no longer limits protection to mainstream reporters; the new version also shields any person ``engaged in journalism.'' In today's expansive media environment, it would be unacceptable to deny the shield to our citizen-journalists. Of course, the reporter shield is not absolute. The public's need to know must be weighed against other goods, and that is why the bill establishes a balancing test that takes into account ``both the public interest in compelling disclosure and the public interest in gathering news and maintaining the free flow of information.'' Specifically, the bill will not protect anonymity when disclosure of a source would prevent imminent harm to national security, imminent death or bodily harm, or the release of personal or health related information. In other words, we are balancing our right to know with our need for security, whether physical or economic. Secrecy is as necessary in extreme circumstances as it is dangerous on the whole. It is on the idea of balance that I would like to conclude. A prosecution, whatever its individual merits, sacrifices something higher when it turns on reporters; and so those merits must be balanced against the broader harms such a prosecution can work. If a free press inexorably creates a free government, as Jefferson suggested, then the agents of that free government, prosecutors included, owe a high debt to journalism. When prosecutors threaten journalism, they have begun to renege on that debt. So I am proud to support this valuable bill, a step toward rebalancing the pursuit of justice and the diffusion of truth.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise to join my colleague Senator Lugar, along with Representatives Boucher and Pence in the House of Representatives, in introducing the Free Flow of Information Act. This bill would protect journalists from being forced to reveal their confidential sources, not as an end in itself, but as a means to a well-informed public. I applaud the tireless efforts of the senior Senator from Indiana, Mr. Lugar, in once again bringing this important issue to the attention of Congress and indeed the nation. I hardly have to read the litany of grave wrongs that have been exposed because journalists called the powerful to account. And I don't have to remind you how many of those exposures relied on confidential sources. Without confidential sources, would we still be ignorant about abuse of power in the Watergate era? Without confidential sources, would Enron still be profiting from fraud? How long would torture at Abu Ghraib have persisted, if proof hadn't been provided to the press? The free flow of information provides the American people its most meaningful check on abuses such as those. Thomas Jefferson said it best: ``If I had to make a choice, to choose the government without the press or to have the press but without the government, I will select the latter without hesitation.'' Jefferson clearly understood that a free Government cannot possibly last without a free press. But today, we find this cornerstone of self-government facing a new threat. This threat has not come from the dictates of a dangerous government, but from the best of intentions. In a spate of recent cases, prosecutors have used subpoenas, fines, and jail time to compel journalists to reveal their anonymous sources. Judith Miller of The New York Times was jailed for 85 days for refusing to reveal a source. Two San Francisco Chronicle reporters were found in contempt of court for refusing to identify sources and hand over material related to the BALCO steroids investigation. A Rhode Island journalist was sentenced to home arrest on similar charges. Last year alone, a total of some two dozen reporters have been subpoenaed or questioned about confidential sources. They were all journalists prosecuted only for the offense of journalism. The impact of these subpoenas on the broader issue of freedom of information is undeniable. Last summer, for instance, the editor-in- chief of Time magazine testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. This is what he said about the fallout from the Justice Department's efforts to obtain confidential information from a Time reporter: ``Valuable sources have insisted that they no longer trusted the magazine and that they would no longer cooperate on stories. The chilling effect is obvious.'' The chilling effect is obvious. Experience has shown us that the most effective constraint on free speech need not be blatant censorship: A few cases like Ms. Miller's and the San Francisco Chronicle's, and news will begin censoring itself. We can only speculate as to how many editors and publishers put the brakes on a story for fear that it could land one of their reporters in a spider web of subpoenas, charges of contempt, and prison. When we minimize the impact of confidential sources, serious journalism is crippled. We will find our papers full of stories more and more palatable to the powerful and secretive. No one argues that that is the intention of those prosecuting these cases; but few deny that it could, in time, be their effect. When journalists are hauled into court and threatened with imprisonment if they don't divulge their sources, we are entering dangerous territory for a democracy. The information we need to remain sovereign will be degraded; the public's right to know will be threatened; and I suggest to you that the liberties we hold dear will be threatened as well. That is exactly why we need a Federal reporter shield. Forty-nine States and the District of Columbia have already recognized that need by enacting similar protection on the state level either through legislation or court decisions; the Free Flow of Information Act simply extends that widely recognized protection to the Federal courts. The new version of this bill expands coverage in two significant ways. First, it will not only protect the information journalists obtain under the promise of confidentiality; it will also cover the ``work product'' of journalists as well, whether or not it was subject to that promise. And second, it no longer limits protection to mainstream reporters; the new version also shields any person ``engaged in journalism.'' In today's expansive media environment, it would be unacceptable to deny the shield to our citizen-journalists. Of course, the reporter shield is not absolute. The public's need to know must be weighed against other goods, and that is why the bill establishes a balancing test that takes into account ``both the public interest in compelling disclosure and the public interest in gathering news and maintaining the free flow of information.'' Specifically, the bill will not protect anonymity when disclosure of a source would prevent imminent harm to national security, imminent death or bodily harm, or the release of personal or health related information. In other words, we are balancing our right to know with our need for security, whether physical or economic. Secrecy is as necessary in extreme circumstances as it is dangerous on the whole. It is on the idea of balance that I would like to conclude. A prosecution, whatever its individual merits, sacrifices something higher when it turns on reporters; and so those merits must be balanced against the broader harms such a prosecution can work. If a free press inexorably creates a free government, as Jefferson suggested, then the agents of that free government, prosecutors included, owe a high debt to journalism. When prosecutors threaten journalism, they have begun to renege on that debt. So I am proud to support this valuable bill, a step toward rebalancing the pursuit of justice and the diffusion of truth.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines have performed valiantly in Iraq in the face of great adversity. The costs of this war have been great to them and our Nation. Over 3,300 brave American servicemembers have been killed in Iraq over 30 from my own State of Connecticut. To date, over $500 billion has been approved by Congress for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, not including the $95.5 billion included in the conference agreement being debated today or the $141.7 billion in additional funding already requested by the administration for fiscal year 2008. In addition, because of the war, our forces have been drained of critical combat gear and training time, adding another element to the costs of this war--our military's combat readiness. Two-thirds of the Army in the United States and 88 percent of our National Guard are reporting 'not ready' for duty, largely due to equipment and training shortfalls. Now, as we have entered the fifth year of the Iraq war, it is long past time for a course correction. Rather than continue abetting the administration's efforts to escalate our entanglement in Iraq's civil war, it is time for Congress to assert itself and heed the American people's call for change. The conference report before us today takes the first steps toward that change. While I wish it would have included stronger language to immediately begin withdrawing combat troops from Iraq and limiting the mission there to counterterrorism, training and equipping Iraqi troops and force protection for remaining U.S. personnel, it does for the first time set some new goals for this administration and the Iraqi Government that will mandate a change of course. For the first time it demands real accountability from the President to take action to restore our military's readiness which has been hollowed out as a result of his policies. And this bill finally provides critical resources for combat gear and protective equipment that the Bush- Cheney-Rumsfeld administration has consistently shortchanged in their budget proposals. Regrettably, as my colleagues know, the President has already said that he will refuse to sign this legislation into law. He has announced his intention to veto this bill because after 4 years of a disastrous war policy, escalating combat deaths, and growing instability in the region, he insists that his is the only way. It is disheartening that President Bush does not see or will not admit that his policy in Iraq is a failure. In plowing ahead on the current course in Iraq, the President has rejected the advice of experts from across the political spectrum, from the Baker-Hamilton Report, and from members of Congress, all of whom have urged him to change the course in Iraq, to diminish our military footprint there, and to start a surge of diplomacy in the region. Like all my colleagues, I want to see success in Iraq. I wish that the President's policies were working. I wish that U.S. combat forces were able to restore security to Baghdad and to other parts of Iraq. I wish that the President had not mismanaged this war from day one. I wish that we had deployed enough troops on the ground to secure the peace at the outset. I wish that Secretary Rumsfeld hadn't run the Coalition Provisional Authority like a staffing agency for Republican political operatives, displacing countless U.S. Foreign Service professionals in the beginning of the war. I wish we hadn't disbanded the Iraqi Army and that we hadn't allowed looting. And I wish that our surge of 30,000 more men and women in uniform into Iraq could be successful in stabilizing that country. But now is not the time for wishful thinking. Now is the time to address the real facts on the ground. This conflict cannot be resolved by increased military action. It requires a coherent, broad-based strategy to promote the political reconciliation necessary to secure the future for Iraq. The bill before us begins that process. If the President determines that the Iraqis are not making progress on key political, security, and economic benchmarks, then, under this legislation, the redeployment of American troops would begin this summer. If, on the other hand, the President determines that the Iraqis are complying with the benchmarks set forth in the legislation, then the redeployment of American forces would begin later in the fall of 2007. These reasonable and responsible timetables and benchmarks will force the President to change his strategy and will incentivize the Iraqi Government to take difficult but necessary steps toward reconciliation, power sharing, and security. This bill also allows for a limited ongoing presence of U.S. forces in Iraq for the specific purposes of training and equipping reliable Iraqi security forces, carrying out counterterrorism operations within Iraq, and providing force protection, because we understand that these vital components will be necessary to ensure a stable and secure Iraq even after our combat troops have been redeployed. Iraqis will continue to need some limited American assistance, and it is in our and Iraq's national interests for that limited support to continue. Exactly 1 day after President Bush disingenuously charged the Democratic Congress for causing what he called ``unacceptable'' delays in troops returning home, Secretary Gates announced that he was immediately extending the tour lengths of those units sent to Iraq to 15 months--3 months longer than before. In addition, 13,000 National Guard troops from Arkansas, Indiana, Oklahoma, and Ohio, as well as other States, were recently told to prepare to be deployed to Iraq. As a result of 4 years of war in Iraq, our Army has been stretched to its breaking point. It is time to say, ``enough is enough.'' And with this supplemental bill, Congress is taking a big step in that direction. This bill holds the President directly responsible for units being deployed who are not ``fully mission capable'', by requiring him to waive requirements that mandate that units fully restock their depleted equipment inventories and restore their mission readiness prior to deployment. It includes funding for critical equipment, including mine-resistant, ambush- protection vehicles which would dramatically lower the number of injuries and casualties sustained by our troops. And it includes billions of dollars for health care for our wounded veterans, many of whom return home with debilitating and life-altering injuries. They have sacrificed everything for this Nation, and at the very least we owe them the best health care available. Sadly, there is no magic formula for fixing the myriad problems in Iraq, as the Baker-Hamilton Commission rightly pointed out. But it is critical that Iraqis make progress on reconciliation and security and that the Government improves the living conditions of its citizens. Iraq's neighbors and regional leaders must also play a role in finding such a solution. The United States and Iraq's neighbors all have long- term interests in the region, and a broken Iraq does not advance those interests. With this supplemental bill, Congress is offering the President an opportunity to change our course in Iraq, to listen and respond to the will of the American people, to support the men and women sacrificing their lives there, and to provide for a responsible change in strategy in Iraq. It is also vital that we make America more resilient here at home. This bill begins to do just that, in providing $325 million to protect the millions of Americans who ride public transportation each day. Our Nation's public transit systems are inadequately prepared to minimize the threat and impact of potential terrorist attacks. Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the Federal Government has invested nearly $24 billion in aviation security--protecting the 1.8 million people who fly on an average day. At the same time, our National Government has invested only $386 million, before the 110th Congress began, in transit security to protect the 14 million people who ride transit on an average workday. Put another way, since 2001, our Nation has spent over $7.50 per passenger on aviation security but less than one penny per transit rider on transit security. I am not suggesting that we ought to be investing equally, but clearly this is not the appropriate balance. As chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, I have made improving our national security a top priority. The very first hearing that I held as chairman focused on increasing the security of our Nation's 14 million daily transit passengers. The very first legislation that the committee considered during my chairmanship was the Public Transportation Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007, which was reported by the Banking Committee unanimously on February 8. The legislation authorizes the distribution of $3.5 billion in security funds, over the next 3 fiscal years, on the basis of risk directly to transit agencies. The Public Transportation Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007 was included as title XV of the 9/11 bill, which the Senate passed on March 13. Senator Shelby and I worked with Senator Byrd and Senator Cochran to include language in the legislation to allow for such sums as necessary to be appropriated in this fiscal year to address the critical needs of our Nation's transit systems. The $325 million included in this appropriations act is a significant investment toward our goal of better securing our Nation's rail and transit systems. This investment builds on the $175 million that was included in the fiscal year 2007 continuing resolution. I once again thank all of the members of the Banking and Appropriations Committees who have worked so hard to advance us to where we are today. This bill also continues congressional efforts to help the citizens of Mississippi and Louisiana rebuild their lives after the catastrophic effects of Hurricane Katrina by including more than $1.3 billion to fund flood and storm damage reduction projects in affected areas. Finally, I want to take a few brief moments to discuss the minimum wage increase provision included in this bill. It has been nearly 10 years since millions of hard-working men and women have seen their wages go up. During that time, inflation has eroded the purchasing power of families being paid the minimum wage. In fact, the real value of the minimum wage has declined $4 below what it was nearly 40 years ago, in 1968. It is currently at its lowest inflation-adjusted level in more than 50 years. During the past 10 years, while the minimum wage remained unchanged, the cost of housing, food, health care, education, transportation, and energy has increased. We cannot reduce poverty if we don't tackle raising the minimum wage. It is simply outrageous that so many Americans live in poverty, and it is long overdue that we take action to reduce the inexcusable and unconscionably high levels of poverty in this country. The language of the Fair Minimum Wage Act, which is included in this bill, will provide a three-step increase in wages over 26 months from the current level of $5.15 per hour to $7.25 per hour. This additional $4,400 per year would allow a low-income family of three to buy 8 months of rent, 15 months of groceries, 19 months of utilities, 20 months of childcare, or more than 24 months of health insurance. I urge the President to seize this opportunity to make America and Iraq stronger and safer. I sincerely hope he will reconsider his decision to veto this bill when it arrives on his desk. Such a veto would be an affirmation of the status quo in America, a status which this Nation can simply no longer afford.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, Saturday, April 28, is Workers Memorial Day. Tomorrow, working men and women around the world will gather to remember their millions of brothers and sisters who have been injured or killed on the job. I join them in their grief-and in their determination to secure a safer future. Work-related accidents kill Americans with a regularity that calls us to question the very word ``accident.'' Fifteen deaths every day, and more than 11,000 injuries: They are grimly predictable and often preventable. Today is for men like Eleazar Torres-Gomez, a laundry worker who was dragged by a conveyor belt into a 300-degree industrial dryer, where he burned to death. Sadness at his death is matched by an equal anger- especially when we learn that, in the two years preceding it, his employer was cited more than 170 times for unsafe, illegal working conditions. We remember Eleazar today. Today is for the 12 miners killed last year in Sago, West Virginia, when an explosion trapped them underground for two days. Only a few years before, the Mine Safety and Health Administration struck down 17 new safety rules for trapped miners--rules that might have saved the miners in Sago. We remember them today. Today is for the 28 union construction workers killed in Connecticut, 20 years ago this month, when the apartment towers they were building collapsed with a roar, within seconds, into ruined concrete and steel. In the wake of their deaths, we outlawed the dangerous lift-slab construction method that led to the collapse. But we can never replace those lives; today we remember them, too. How can we honor them? I know this much: Words alone would be an insult. The men and women we remember this Saturday risked their lives so we could lie down and wake up in health and safety and comfort, and merely speaking our gratitude would be emptier than doing nothing. We owe them action. We owe them action equal to the historic Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA), which was passed 37 years ago tomorrow and has saved an estimated 350,000 lives. We need to cover more workers--because more than 8.5 million are not protected by OSHA. We need more resources for inspection and enforcement--because, at the current rate, federal inspectors are only able to examine workplaces, on average, once every 133 years. We need stiffer penalties for employers who knowingly put their workers' lives at risk--because employers like those who compromised Mr. Torres-Gomez's life now face a maximum penalty of a simple misdemeanor. And we need the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to take its work more seriously--because, according to a New York Times report released this week, ``the agency has killed dozens of existing and proposed regulations and delayed adopting others.'' Taking these vital steps for workers adds up to more than increased resources or stronger oversight--ultimately, it translates to respect. We owe their memories nothing less. Five thousand seven hundred workers were killed on the job last year, and our economic prosperity is built on their flesh and blood. More than half a century ago, George Orwell remarked on the disregard that so often greets manual labor: ``It keeps us alive, and we are oblivious of its existence. . . . We are capable of forgetting it as we forget the blood in our veins.'' Today we pledge ourselves as the exception to that rule. And if we mean our words, we will be the exception tomorrow, and the day after that. For America's working men and women deserve nothing less than our eternal gratitude and diligence in preventing future workplace tragedies.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise to introduce the College Saver's Credit Act, a bill designed to open the dream of higher education to many more Americans. Few choices in life have the economic consequence as the decision to enter college. Compare college-educated workers to their high-school- educated peers: those with a college diploma will earn $1 million more over the course of a lifetime than their peers without one. That million- dollar difference lays bare the power in college access. And yet there are literally hundreds of thousands of young men and women who want to choose a college education, and cannot. These young men and women are prepared to enter into our college-educated middle class--prepared in intellect, prepared in maturity, prepared in ambition--and are shut out by the cost of tuition. This year, 400,000 high school seniors whose families have low or moderate incomes will be priced out of college. Of those, nearly 200,000 will never attend college at all. They will lose their chance at higher education, and as a consequence, they will face almost twice the odds of unemployment. And unless we take action, the number of excluded Americans is only likely to increase. Over the past 10 years, the cost of attending a 4- year public college has increased by more than $2,800, or 96 percent, and the cost of attending a four-year private college has increased by more than $9,000, or 71 percent. These costs continue to rise today. We must take steps to break down these barriers to access, starting by making it easier for families to save for higher education. The refundable College Saver's Credit created by this act would do just that--even as it boosts personal and national savings, at a time when these rates are setting new lows. It would provide a powerful complement to the other forms of financial aid available to students, which, I might add, we should also continue to work to strengthen. The College Saver's Credit would be available to low- and moderate- income taxpayers who save in Section 529 college savings plans: specifically, to joint filers making up to $60,000, heads of households making up to $45,000, and all other taxpayers making up to $30,000, with all numbers indexed for inflation. In other words, the credit is designed to provide the greatest benefit to those who have the greatest difficulty affording college. Taxpayers could claim a 50 percent credit for Section 529 plan contributions, up to a maximum credit of $2,000. The College Saver's Credit would be fully refundable--meaning that even taxpayers who do not make enough money to have a high tax liability would be eligible to claim the credit's full value--provided that the refunded amount is put towards qualified higher educational expenses. Any refund would be deposited directly and automatically into the taxpayer's or taxpayer's beneficiary's designated 529 college savings plan, taking advantage of the IRS's new ``split refund'' option. Funds attributable to refunds from the College Saver's Credit could accumulate earnings tax-free (like the rest of the taxpayer's savings in a 529 plan), but may only be distributed to pay college costs--otherwise, they must be returned to the Treasury. In his budget this year, President Bush proposed expanding the Saver's Credit for retirement savings to section 529 college savings plans. Establishing the refundable College Saver's Credit would accomplish this goal in a way that provides the greatest value to those Americans who need it most. And in doing that, this bill accomplishes two worthy, and linked, goals: It encourages Americans to plan and prepare for the future; and it truly widens the doors to college. Savings and education: They are pillars of our prosperity--prosperity that will grow even as it is shared more widely. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Management Act of 2007. Food allergies are an increasing food safety and public health concern in this country, especially among young children. I know firsthand just how frightening food allergies can be in a young person's life. My own family has been personally touched by this troubling condition and we continue to struggle with it each and every day. Sadly, there is no cure for food allergies. In the past 5 years, the number of Americans with food allergies has nearly doubled from 6 million to almost 12 million. While food allergies were at one time considered relatively infrequent, today they rank 3rd among common chronic diseases in children under 18 years of age. Peanuts are among several allergenic foods that can produce life threatening allergic reactions in susceptible children. Peanut allergies have doubled among school age children from 1997-2002. Clearly, food allergies are of great concern for school age children nationwide, and yet, there are no federal guidelines concerning the management of life threatening food allergies in our Nation's schools. I have heard from parents, teachers and school administrators that students with severe food allergies often face inconsistent food allergy management approaches when they change schools. Too often, families are not aware of the food allergy policy at their children's school, or the policy is vastly different from the one they knew at their previous school, and they are left wondering whether their child is safe. Recently, Connecticut became the first State to enact school-based guidelines concerning food allergies and the prevention of life threatening incidents in schools. I am very proud of these efforts, and I know that the parents of children who suffer from food allergies in Connecticut have confidence that their children are safe throughout the school day. States such as Massachusetts and Tennessee have enacted similar guidelines and Vermont, New Jersey, Arizona, Michigan and New York have either passed or have pending legislation to enact statewide guidelines. But too many States across the country have food allergy management guidelines that are inconsistent from one school district to the next. The result is a patchwork of guidelines that not only may vary from state to state, but also from school district to school district. In my view, this lack of consistency underscores the need for enactment of uniform Federal policies that school districts can choose to adopt and implement. For this reason, I am introducing the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Management Act of 2007 today to address the growing need for uniform and consistent school-based food allergy management policy. The bill I am introducing today closely mirrors legislation I introduced last Congress with former Senator Frist. I thank him for his past leadership and commitment to this important legislation. The legislation does two things. First, it directs the Secretary of Health and Human Services, in consultation with the Secretary of Education, to develop and make available voluntary food allergy management guidelines for preventing exposure to food allergens and assuring a prompt response when a student suffers a potentially fatal anaphylactic reaction. The guidelines developed by the Secretary are voluntary, not mandatory. Under the legislation, each school district across the country can voluntarily choose to implement these guidelines. The intent of the legislation is not to mandate individual school policy, but rather to provide for consistency of policies relating to school-based food allergy management by providing schools with consistent guidelines at the Federal level. Second, the bill provides for incentive grants to school districts to assist them with adoption and implementation of the federal government's allergy management guidelines in all K-12 public schools. I would like to recognize the leadership of Congresswoman Nita Lowey who is introducing companion legislation today in the House of Representatives. She has been a longstanding champion for children and for awareness of the devastating impact of food allergies. I also wish to acknowledge and offer my sincere appreciation to the members of the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network for their commitment to this legislation and for raising public awareness, providing advocacy, and advancing research on behalf of all individuals who suffer from food allergies. This legislation is supported by the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network and the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology. I ask unanimous consent that letters of support from these organizations be printed in the Record. I hope that my colleagues in the Senate and in the House will consider and pass this important legislation before the end of the year so that the Department of Health and Human Services can begin work on developing national guidelines as soon as possible. Schoolchildren across the country deserve nothing less than a safe and healthy learning environment. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise to introduce the College Saver's Credit Act, a bill designed to open the dream of higher education to many more Americans. Few choices in life have the economic consequence as the decision to enter college. Compare college-educated workers to their high-school- educated peers: those with a college diploma will earn $1 million more over the course of a lifetime than their peers without one. That million- dollar difference lays bare the power in college access. And yet there are literally hundreds of thousands of young men and women who want to choose a college education, and cannot. These young men and women are prepared to enter into our college-educated middle class--prepared in intellect, prepared in maturity, prepared in ambition--and are shut out by the cost of tuition. This year, 400,000 high school seniors whose families have low or moderate incomes will be priced out of college. Of those, nearly 200,000 will never attend college at all. They will lose their chance at higher education, and as a consequence, they will face almost twice the odds of unemployment. And unless we take action, the number of excluded Americans is only likely to increase. Over the past 10 years, the cost of attending a 4- year public college has increased by more than $2,800, or 96 percent, and the cost of attending a four-year private college has increased by more than $9,000, or 71 percent. These costs continue to rise today. We must take steps to break down these barriers to access, starting by making it easier for families to save for higher education. The refundable College Saver's Credit created by this act would do just that--even as it boosts personal and national savings, at a time when these rates are setting new lows. It would provide a powerful complement to the other forms of financial aid available to students, which, I might add, we should also continue to work to strengthen. The College Saver's Credit would be available to low- and moderate- income taxpayers who save in Section 529 college savings plans: specifically, to joint filers making up to $60,000, heads of households making up to $45,000, and all other taxpayers making up to $30,000, with all numbers indexed for inflation. In other words, the credit is designed to provide the greatest benefit to those who have the greatest difficulty affording college. Taxpayers could claim a 50 percent credit for Section 529 plan contributions, up to a maximum credit of $2,000. The College Saver's Credit would be fully refundable--meaning that even taxpayers who do not make enough money to have a high tax liability would be eligible to claim the credit's full value--provided that the refunded amount is put towards qualified higher educational expenses. Any refund would be deposited directly and automatically into the taxpayer's or taxpayer's beneficiary's designated 529 college savings plan, taking advantage of the IRS's new ``split refund'' option. Funds attributable to refunds from the College Saver's Credit could accumulate earnings tax-free (like the rest of the taxpayer's savings in a 529 plan), but may only be distributed to pay college costs--otherwise, they must be returned to the Treasury. In his budget this year, President Bush proposed expanding the Saver's Credit for retirement savings to section 529 college savings plans. Establishing the refundable College Saver's Credit would accomplish this goal in a way that provides the greatest value to those Americans who need it most. And in doing that, this bill accomplishes two worthy, and linked, goals: It encourages Americans to plan and prepare for the future; and it truly widens the doors to college. Savings and education: They are pillars of our prosperity--prosperity that will grow even as it is shared more widely. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Management Act of 2007. Food allergies are an increasing food safety and public health concern in this country, especially among young children. I know firsthand just how frightening food allergies can be in a young person's life. My own family has been personally touched by this troubling condition and we continue to struggle with it each and every day. Sadly, there is no cure for food allergies. In the past 5 years, the number of Americans with food allergies has nearly doubled from 6 million to almost 12 million. While food allergies were at one time considered relatively infrequent, today they rank 3rd among common chronic diseases in children under 18 years of age. Peanuts are among several allergenic foods that can produce life threatening allergic reactions in susceptible children. Peanut allergies have doubled among school age children from 1997-2002. Clearly, food allergies are of great concern for school age children nationwide, and yet, there are no federal guidelines concerning the management of life threatening food allergies in our Nation's schools. I have heard from parents, teachers and school administrators that students with severe food allergies often face inconsistent food allergy management approaches when they change schools. Too often, families are not aware of the food allergy policy at their children's school, or the policy is vastly different from the one they knew at their previous school, and they are left wondering whether their child is safe. Recently, Connecticut became the first State to enact school-based guidelines concerning food allergies and the prevention of life threatening incidents in schools. I am very proud of these efforts, and I know that the parents of children who suffer from food allergies in Connecticut have confidence that their children are safe throughout the school day. States such as Massachusetts and Tennessee have enacted similar guidelines and Vermont, New Jersey, Arizona, Michigan and New York have either passed or have pending legislation to enact statewide guidelines. But too many States across the country have food allergy management guidelines that are inconsistent from one school district to the next. The result is a patchwork of guidelines that not only may vary from state to state, but also from school district to school district. In my view, this lack of consistency underscores the need for enactment of uniform Federal policies that school districts can choose to adopt and implement. For this reason, I am introducing the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Management Act of 2007 today to address the growing need for uniform and consistent school-based food allergy management policy. The bill I am introducing today closely mirrors legislation I introduced last Congress with former Senator Frist. I thank him for his past leadership and commitment to this important legislation. The legislation does two things. First, it directs the Secretary of Health and Human Services, in consultation with the Secretary of Education, to develop and make available voluntary food allergy management guidelines for preventing exposure to food allergens and assuring a prompt response when a student suffers a potentially fatal anaphylactic reaction. The guidelines developed by the Secretary are voluntary, not mandatory. Under the legislation, each school district across the country can voluntarily choose to implement these guidelines. The intent of the legislation is not to mandate individual school policy, but rather to provide for consistency of policies relating to school-based food allergy management by providing schools with consistent guidelines at the Federal level. Second, the bill provides for incentive grants to school districts to assist them with adoption and implementation of the federal government's allergy management guidelines in all K-12 public schools. I would like to recognize the leadership of Congresswoman Nita Lowey who is introducing companion legislation today in the House of Representatives. She has been a longstanding champion for children and for awareness of the devastating impact of food allergies. I also wish to acknowledge and offer my sincere appreciation to the members of the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network for their commitment to this legislation and for raising public awareness, providing advocacy, and advancing research on behalf of all individuals who suffer from food allergies. This legislation is supported by the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network and the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology. I ask unanimous consent that letters of support from these organizations be printed in the Record. I hope that my colleagues in the Senate and in the House will consider and pass this important legislation before the end of the year so that the Department of Health and Human Services can begin work on developing national guidelines as soon as possible. Schoolchildren across the country deserve nothing less than a safe and healthy learning environment. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for yielding. I thank my colleague for his consideration. For those of us who remember the days of Russell Long talking about the employee stock option plans, we all were lectured considerably during our tenure here with Russell Long, who was a strong advocate of the idea of employees being able to have an invested ownership in companies. I applaud my colleague from Vermont for this idea. It is one that certainly deserves consideration. I have told my colleague from Vermont I will be happy to either conduct the hearing myself or have an appropriate subcommittee conduct it, and be involved with it, as well as the Banking Committee to look at this. The jurisdiction may also be in the Finance Committee. I know Senator Baucus has an interest in this issue as well, so I want to be careful about stepping on the toes of another committee that may have some piece of this as well as the Banking Committee. But it is an economic development issue, and I am sure, between Senator Baucus and myself, we can conduct a hearing that will complement both committees' jurisdictions.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for his observation. I see my friend from Alabama is in the Chamber, the former chairman of the committee, my ranking member, who cares about this issue as well. I know of his interest in the subject matter. So we will move forward on this issue in a timely fashion to see if we can have a good hearing and develop further interest in this idea, which I think has great merit. I thank the Senator for raising it.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I wish to express my support for ensuring the ongoing competitiveness of U.S. capital markets, our economy and American workers. I have served on the Banking Committee since my first day in the Senate 26 years ago. During my tenure on the committee, and now as its chairman, preserving and strengthening America's preeminent position as the world's leading financial center has been among my primary objectives. Based on that experience, I would like to share what I believe are three important considerations that should guide us in any discussion of how to make America's capital markets more competitive. First, we must remain mindful that our markets remain the largest, most liquid, and most transparent on the planet. Second, the current and continued success of those markets depends on the presence of effective, efficient legal rules that protect investors; as such, we should resist the temptation to engage in a regulatory race to the bottom as a rationale to stay on top. Members of the Senate resisted that temptation yesterday when they voted, overwhelmingly, to defeat an amendment that would have significantly weakened a critical investor protection provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. I want to thank the sponsors of this amendment, Senator Schumer and Senator Crapo, for their vote opposing yesterday's amendment. In doing so, they affirmed their support for an efficient and effective regulatory structure and ongoing efforts at the Securities and Exchange Commission to lower the cost of compliance for small businesses. Third the success of our markets also depends on our Nation's ability to educate, train, and recruit the kind of talented and driven people who can compete and win in the global economy. We should do all we can to promote the ongoing competitiveness of America's capital markets. Our Nation's ability to strengthen security, create opportunity, and expand prosperity for every citizen depends in large part on the success of our capital markets and of our financial services sector generally. Maintaining the preeminence of capital markets will not be easy. It will require honest and thoughtful leadership. As chairman of the Banking Committee, I look forward to furthering the dialogue on this important issue. Mr. President, I ask for unanimous consent that the following remarks on competitiveness that I recently delivered to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in March be inserted into the Record immediately following my statement.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, today I rise to introduce the Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention Act of 2007, important legislation that promotes awareness and prevention of Shaken Baby Syndrome, a devastating form of child abuse that results in the severe injury, disability or death of hundreds of children each year. Child abuse and neglect is a well-documented tragedy for some of our youngest and most vulnerable citizens. According to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS) almost 900,000 children were victims of abuse and neglect in 2005. More than four children die every single day as a result of abusive maltreatment in this country. Babies are particularly vulnerable; in 2005, children aged 12 months or younger accounted for nearly 42 percent of all child abuse and neglect fatalities and children under age 3 accounted for almost 77 percent. Yet even these disturbing statistics may not paint an accurate picture; most experts agree that child abuse is widely under-reported. Abusive head trauma, including Shaken Baby Syndrome, is the leading cause of death of physically abused children, in particular for infants younger than one. When a frustrated caregiver loses control and violently shakes a baby or impacts the baby's head, the trauma can kill the child or cause severe injuries, including loss of vision, loss of hearing, brain damage, paralysis, and/or seizures, resulting in lifelong disabilities and creating profound grief for many families. Far too many children have experienced the horrible devastation of Shaken Baby Syndrome. A 2003 report in the Journal of the American Medical Association estimates that as a result of Shaken Baby Syndrome, an average of 300 U.S. children will die each year, and 600 to 1,200 more will be injured, of whom two-thirds will be infants younger than one. Medical professionals believe that thousands of Shaken Baby Syndrome cases are misdiagnosed or undetected, as many children do not immediately exhibit obvious symptoms after the abuse. Prevention programs can significantly reduce the number of cases of Shaken Baby Syndrome. For example, the Upstate New York SBS Prevention Project at Children's Hospital of Buffalo has used a simple video to educate new parents before they leave the hospital, reducing the number of shaken baby incidents in the area by nearly 50 percent. In Connecticut, a multifaceted prevention approach involving hospitals, schools, childcare providers, and community-based organizations in awareness and training activities, including home visits and targeted outreach, has raised awareness and encouraged prevention across the state. Hospitals in many States educate new parents about the dangers of shaking a baby, yet it is estimated that less than 60 percent of parents of newborns receive information about the dangers of shaking a baby. Without more outreach, education and training, the risk of Shaken Baby Syndrome will persist. With the introduction of the Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention Act of 2007, I hope to reduce the number of children injured or killed by abusive head trauma, and ultimately to eliminate Shaken Baby Syndrome. Our initiative provides for the creation of a public health campaign, including development of a National Action Plan to identify effective, evidence-based strategies for prevention and awareness of SBS, and establishment of a cross-disciplinary advisory council to help coordinate national efforts. The campaign will educate the general public, parents, child care providers, health care professionals and others about the dangers of shaking, as well as healthy preventative approaches for frustrated parents and caregivers coping with a crying or fussy infant. The legislation ensures support for families who have been affected by SBS, and for families and caregivers struggling with infant crying, through a 24-hour hotline and an informational website. All of these activities are to be implemented through the coordination of existing programs and/or the establishment of new efforts, to bring together the best in current prevention, awareness and education practices to be expanded into areas in need. Awareness is absolutely critical to prevention. Families, professionals and caregivers responsible for infants and young children and must learn about the dangers of violent shaking and abusive impacts to the head. On behalf of the victims of Shaken Baby Syndrome, including Cynthia from New York, Hannah from California, Sarah from New York, Kierra from Nevada, Miranda from Pennsylvania, Taylor from Illinois, Cassandra from Arizona, Gabriela from Florida, Amber from New York, Bennett from Missouri, Jamison from Florida, Maggie from Texas, Dalton from Indiana, Stephen from Texas, Kaden from Washington, Joseph from Texas, Dawson from Pennsylvania, Macie from Minnesota, Jake from Maine, Benjamin from Michigan, Chloe from New Mexico, Madison of Oklahoma, Peanut from Texas, Nykkole from Minnesota, Gianna from Rhode Island, Brynn from Washington, Rachael from Texas, Jack from Maryland, Ryan from Virginia, David from California, Reagan from Virginia, Skipper from New York, and many other innocent lives lost or damaged, I look forward to working with my colleagues to see that this legislation becomes law so that we can expand efforts to eradicate Shaken Baby Syndrome. I ask unanimous consent that a list of groups supporting this resolution be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, today I rise to introduce the Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention Act of 2007, important legislation that promotes awareness and prevention of Shaken Baby Syndrome, a devastating form of child abuse that results in the severe injury, disability or death of hundreds of children each year. Child abuse and neglect is a well-documented tragedy for some of our youngest and most vulnerable citizens. According to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS) almost 900,000 children were victims of abuse and neglect in 2005. More than four children die every single day as a result of abusive maltreatment in this country. Babies are particularly vulnerable; in 2005, children aged 12 months or younger accounted for nearly 42 percent of all child abuse and neglect fatalities and children under age 3 accounted for almost 77 percent. Yet even these disturbing statistics may not paint an accurate picture; most experts agree that child abuse is widely under-reported. Abusive head trauma, including Shaken Baby Syndrome, is the leading cause of death of physically abused children, in particular for infants younger than one. When a frustrated caregiver loses control and violently shakes a baby or impacts the baby's head, the trauma can kill the child or cause severe injuries, including loss of vision, loss of hearing, brain damage, paralysis, and/or seizures, resulting in lifelong disabilities and creating profound grief for many families. Far too many children have experienced the horrible devastation of Shaken Baby Syndrome. A 2003 report in the Journal of the American Medical Association estimates that as a result of Shaken Baby Syndrome, an average of 300 U.S. children will die each year, and 600 to 1,200 more will be injured, of whom two-thirds will be infants younger than one. Medical professionals believe that thousands of Shaken Baby Syndrome cases are misdiagnosed or undetected, as many children do not immediately exhibit obvious symptoms after the abuse. Prevention programs can significantly reduce the number of cases of Shaken Baby Syndrome. For example, the Upstate New York SBS Prevention Project at Children's Hospital of Buffalo has used a simple video to educate new parents before they leave the hospital, reducing the number of shaken baby incidents in the area by nearly 50 percent. In Connecticut, a multifaceted prevention approach involving hospitals, schools, childcare providers, and community-based organizations in awareness and training activities, including home visits and targeted outreach, has raised awareness and encouraged prevention across the state. Hospitals in many States educate new parents about the dangers of shaking a baby, yet it is estimated that less than 60 percent of parents of newborns receive information about the dangers of shaking a baby. Without more outreach, education and training, the risk of Shaken Baby Syndrome will persist. With the introduction of the Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention Act of 2007, I hope to reduce the number of children injured or killed by abusive head trauma, and ultimately to eliminate Shaken Baby Syndrome. Our initiative provides for the creation of a public health campaign, including development of a National Action Plan to identify effective, evidence-based strategies for prevention and awareness of SBS, and establishment of a cross-disciplinary advisory council to help coordinate national efforts. The campaign will educate the general public, parents, child care providers, health care professionals and others about the dangers of shaking, as well as healthy preventative approaches for frustrated parents and caregivers coping with a crying or fussy infant. The legislation ensures support for families who have been affected by SBS, and for families and caregivers struggling with infant crying, through a 24-hour hotline and an informational website. All of these activities are to be implemented through the coordination of existing programs and/or the establishment of new efforts, to bring together the best in current prevention, awareness and education practices to be expanded into areas in need. Awareness is absolutely critical to prevention. Families, professionals and caregivers responsible for infants and young children and must learn about the dangers of violent shaking and abusive impacts to the head. On behalf of the victims of Shaken Baby Syndrome, including Cynthia from New York, Hannah from California, Sarah from New York, Kierra from Nevada, Miranda from Pennsylvania, Taylor from Illinois, Cassandra from Arizona, Gabriela from Florida, Amber from New York, Bennett from Missouri, Jamison from Florida, Maggie from Texas, Dalton from Indiana, Stephen from Texas, Kaden from Washington, Joseph from Texas, Dawson from Pennsylvania, Macie from Minnesota, Jake from Maine, Benjamin from Michigan, Chloe from New Mexico, Madison of Oklahoma, Peanut from Texas, Nykkole from Minnesota, Gianna from Rhode Island, Brynn from Washington, Rachael from Texas, Jack from Maryland, Ryan from Virginia, David from California, Reagan from Virginia, Skipper from New York, and many other innocent lives lost or damaged, I look forward to working with my colleagues to see that this legislation becomes law so that we can expand efforts to eradicate Shaken Baby Syndrome. I ask unanimous consent that a list of groups supporting this resolution be printed in the Record.

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, let me briefly first thank my colleague from Alabama, Senator Shelby, the former chairman of the Banking Committee, who will also be offering this amendment for the consideration of our colleagues. Our markets, I think all of us know, are the most fair and efficient in the world due to many reasons, but in large part to our strong statutory and regulatory schemes in the country. The amendment we are offering recognizes the very significant role of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of improving and maintaining the integrity of the capital markets of this country, as well as the important role of small businesses in economic growth and job creation. We all remember and understand very well the debate that went on a number of years ago as a result of some of the disasters that occurred in Enron and WorldCom to make sure our public companies would be more accountable and more responsive to the concerns of the shareholders. The SEC and the PCAOB have determined that the existing implementation of section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley legislation has not fully achieved the intent of the statute. Last December, they proposed management guidance and revised auditing standards to more appropriately implement the statute, without having an unintended or inappropriate impact on small businesses. The amendment I offer with my colleague from Alabama expresses the sense of the Senate that the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board continue their rulemaking and finalize their ongoing rulemaking process. These two agencies are currently considering about 200 comments and letters from the public commenting on their proposed regulations dealing with section 404. The letters come from a wide variety of interested parties, offering views on the strengths of the proposals and suggestions for those improvements. The capital markets and all businesses, including small businesses, will be better served by a deliberative process of rulemaking conducted by these agencies. I commend Chris Cox for the fine job he is doing at the SEC. They have responded very well to the concerns about the section 404 requirements, particularly the smaller public companies. SEC Chairman Cox has recently said: We don't need to change the law. I am quoting him now, Mr. President. We need to change the way the law is implemented. It is the implementation of the law that has caused the excessive burden, not the law itself. That is an important distinction. He goes on to say. I don't believe these important investor protections, which are even now only a few years old, should be opened up to an amendment, or that they need to be. I agree with Chris Cox, President Bush's appointee to head up the SEC. They are doing a very fine job. I think it would be irresponsible for us at this juncture to jump in and basically reduce by 80 percent the number of companies that would have to comply with section 404. Let the SEC do their job. That is what we have asked them to do. They are responsible. They are a responsible agency in charge of looking at this. If and when they come back, and there are those of us here who feel they haven't gone far enough, that those burdens still exist, then I would welcome an opportunity to address that. But it is very premature to jump in at this juncture while the SEC is doing the job we asked them to do, acting responsibly, and performing their public functions under good leadership. It seems to me this is not a moment for us to jump into the middle of this and by a vote of small margins decide we are going to tell these agencies what to do with the professional staffs they have and the commentary process where the public has an opportunity to address and comment on the suggested rule changes that Christopher Cox and his staff at the SEC and the other commissioners are considering at this moment. So for all of those reasons, we are offering this amendment which offers us an opportunity to express our concerns about where this is headed. Let's send a message that we are watching very carefully, we care about this, but avoid the situation of this body engaging in a regulatory process, which is properly left to the agencies charged with that responsibility. For those reasons I urge the adoption of the Dodd- Shelby amendment. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to add Senator Reed of Rhode Island, the chairman of the subcommittee, as a cosponsor of the amendment.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I yield the floor.