Robert Dole

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, let me indicate there will be no more votes today. I understand that the major amendment on the other side, the so- called Glenn-Chafee, et al, amendment, will be laid down and that will be debated this afternoon, and then on Monday I understand the distinguished Democratic leader would like to change the time of the cloture vote from 5 to 6 p.m.

Mr. DOLE

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

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. I know some of these things are very technical and I do not profess to understand some of these technical provisions. I am not on the committee and have not followed that closely. I know they are meeting as we speak. Hopefully, we can do that.

Mr. DOLE. I have no objection to that. Somebody suggested 30 minutes, if they do not work it out. I will not be that arbitrary, but I think after some reasonable time, 30 to 45 minutes, that would be satisfactory.

Mr. DOLE. I hope, too. The reason for the cloture motion is to make certain we do finish the bill. If we cannot get cloture, we will not finish the bill on Tuesday. It is my hope we can finish the bill on Tuesday. Let me again indicate to all my colleagues who are at the majority leader. The August recess is not far away--at least the starting date is not far away. We have a certain number, I think a number of legitimate things we should do before that recess begins. It may not begin on the 4th of August. It may not begin until the 12th or the 15th, or in that area. That is not a threat, just what may happen. I put in the Record yesterday a proposed schedule which I believe is reasonable, but it depends on finishing this bill and then moving to the next bill, and appropriation bills. We hope to do six appropriation bills before the August recess. We have three major authorization bills: DOD authorization bill, foreign operations, State Department authorization. That will take some time. There will be a lot of amendments. Six appropriation bills, plus welfare reform, plus Bosnia, plus lobbying and gift reform, plus the Ryan White bill. That is the reason the cloture was filed. Hopefully, if we cannot work it out, we will have a cloture vote on Tuesday, which I hope would be successful. Then we would at least have the end in sight. Obviously, if we are making progress, and we are going to finish the bill Tuesday in any event, I would be happy to withdraw the cloture motion.

Mr. DOLE. As we discussed earlier, obviously, if the amendments on either side are acceptable, that is certainly satisfactory to both the leaders, because some Members are necessarily absent, and there is no need to punish Members who are not here. On the other hand, if we cannot agree, we ought to have the votes, and everybody was notified there could be votes throughout the afternoon on Friday. As far as I know, the afternoon does not end at 1 o'clock. It ends much, much later. We will be here. As far as I am concerned, we will have votes. If we reach an impasse, or once I think the major amendments have been laid down on the so-called Glenn amendment--I think that will take considerable debate. Until that happens, I would hope we would continue to work out some of the amendments.

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, we are making some progress. We would like to work through the afternoon. I had a discussion with the distinguished Democratic leader about there being a number of votes on Monday. We may move the time for the cloture vote, depending on what I hear from the Democratic leader. I have also indicated that in addition to that cloture vote, if cloture fails, there will be another cloture vote on Tuesday.

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

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. That is fair.

Mr. DOLE. There will be a motion to table.

Mr. DOLE. Will the Senator from Massachusetts take 40 minutes, and we will take 20 minutes?

Mr. DOLE. Will the Senator agree to a time agreement? Great. Mr. DASCHLE addressed the Chair.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. The Senator could start speaking on that.

Mr. DOLE. Let me suggest that as soon as we dispose of the amendment offered by the Senator from Louisiana, the Senator from California be recognized to offer an amendment.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I know there has been a unanimous-consent agreement. Do we have any time agreements or just consent to start something?

Mr. DOLE. In some cases, there may be second-degree amendments on either side. So it may take a bit longer than 30 minutes.

Mr. DOLE. We do not even know what the first-degree amendment is.

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I know the media have a tough job to do. But if I believed everything I saw on the evening news or in the newspapers, I would vote against this bill, too. I imagine if all of the anchor people were on the floor, they would vote against it because they would not read it. They would just listen to some liberal on the other side of the aisle and swallow it all and say ``I am against it.'' Fortunately, the facts are on our side, even if some folks in the media are not. This is not a question of partisanship, not a question of anything but commonsense reform. Maybe those who report the news at the big networks do not worry about things that people have to put up with, the people in my State of Kansas, like businessmen and women, farmers, and ranchers. That is not their concern. They buy into ``the more Government the better.'' If you have little Government, let us have a little more regulation, which costs the average family $6,000 a year. So we will continue to try to correct the record. We know that it will never make the news. In fact, I challenged the media yesterday, when we had all these imminent scientists and a former FDA commissioner there, to report something they said. There was not one peep, because they were trying to give us facts, not the liberal spin. It makes a great difference in this body and in this town.

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I send a second-degree amendment to the desk.

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I send a second-degree amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I believe this is a responsible second- degree amendment, that we can dispose of a number of these issues in the spirit expressed this morning by the Democratic leader and managers of the bill so we can move on and try to complete action on this bill no later than next Tuesday. It is offered in that spirit, the spirit of cooperation. My view is it is a good amendment. I hoped it might be acceptable. It seems to me that it would save hours and hours of debate here and put to rest all the arguments that some people like to make about which party or which side of the aisle is more concerned about some of the health and safety regulations. We are ready to stipulate we are just as concerned as they are on the other side. We think this would lay that to rest. I would hope the amendment would be accepted.

Mr. DOLE. No.

Mr. DOLE. Will there be any second-degree amendments on Domenici?

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, if the Senator from Arizona will yield to me a moment, we would like to get a time agreement on the Domenici amendment and then whatever we work out on the Lautenberg amendment. We would like to have a window of opportunity from 7 until 8 where there will be no votes. So if we can have one vote before 7, and then any other votes will be after 8 o'clock. Maybe we can work that out during the 10 minutes.